Dating a White Fang Grunt
by thenextgamer
Summary: You'd never think a relationship like this would ever work out. Neither of them did. Despite it all though, they really do want to try and make this work. To become friends with the enemy and fall in love with them the next day. If anyone ever finds out about this, they are sooo gonna be dead... Contains Fluff.
1. Red Riding Hood and The Big Bad Wolf

Ruby Rose waited outside the entrance of the carnival, tapping her foot with a nervous edge.

She pulled out her scroll to check the clock again for the fifth time around, and then sighed when she realized that it hadn't even been two minutes since she arrived.

"I wonder if I came too early…" She mumbled to herself. She looked around once more, yet was unable to find the person she hoped would have shown up by now.

Maybe she should take the time to calm down and check if she looked alright.

She pulled out her scroll again to check on her reflection, using it to help tidy up her hair a bit. Then she checked her teeth on the off chance that she might have any food stuck on them, in order to prevent any embarrassing moments.

She breathed into her palm and sniffed it, nodding to herself when she found it to still be as minty fresh as ever. Cautiously, she took a quick sniff of both of her armpits and then gave a satisfactory hum as she smelt no sweat.

With that all done, she pocketed away her scroll and took a deep breath to calm her nerves.

All that was left now, was to wait patiently for him to arrive.

…

Doobee do be doo… Smack smack, pop pop. Tsktsktsktsktsktsktsktsktsktsktsktsk.

Pbhbhbhbhbhfft.

Sigh…

Absentmindedly, she began playing the beat of her favorite song by slapping her knees.

"They see you as small and helpless… Dada dadada da da… Hmhm hmhm hmmmhhmmm…"

"I'm here!"

She perked up and smiled, hearing her date finally arrive. .

She faced him as he ran up to her, the young man clutching a black fabric object in his hands as he breathed heavily out of exhaustion.

"Sorry if I'm late! I came as soon as I was available!" He wheezed, clutching his knees as he bent over, out of breath.

"It's okay! I don't think you were late at all!" Ruby reassured him, "I got here pretty early, so the fault's on me for having to wait so long."

"Right, so, uh…" He cleared his throat to regain his composure, before awkwardly smiling at her, "Ready for our… uh… date?"

Ruby shyly faced away from him. With a blushing grin, she nodded.

"Cool, cool…" He exclaimed, slowly nodding back.

They stayed silent for a moment, both of them having no idea how to proceed. The awkwardness in the air was so thick, you could throw a knife at it and it would bounce off.

Ruby took a quick glance at his hands to realize that he was holding onto a black hoodie.

With a disappointed frown, she asked, "Why did you bring your uniform with you?"

"Oh! Uh…" He gave a startled look when she pointed out the clothes in his grip, before explaining, "When I said that I came as soon as I was available, I kinda meant that literally…" He scratched his neck with a nervous chuckle as the wolf ears on his head lowered in embarrassment, "I didn't have time to properly put away my uniform since I was in such a hurry to… uh… get here on time. Aheheh…"

"Won't somebody notice you carrying that?"

"Yeah, no, definitely." He took a quick look around, before his ears visibly straightened up as he found a trashcan nearby. Quickly jogging over to it, he stuffed the hoodie and mask inside and returned to his partner's side. "There, problem solved."

Ruby smirked at her date's antics as she stated, "That's going to freak someone out if it ever gets found."

"Sucks for the guy who finds it then." The young man quipped, holding his hands behind his head and walking up to the carnival entrance. "Come on, let's go have fun."

"Alright." She nodded, walking beside him as they entered inside.

* * *

I wasn't sure how I ended up thinking this was a good idea. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's not like I regret asking her out or anything. She was nice, and cute, and charming- I think it'd only be natural for me to feel this way about her eventually.

But even you have to admit, this might be the dumbest idea anyone will ever have that could easily blow up in our faces and hurt everyone involved.

Well… I mean, I guess that was sort of the appeal in it? Or something? Like, Romeo and Juliet had that forbidden romance going on with their two families hating each other, and that ended up with them- actually no, that's a terrible example.

This whole thing with us didn't even start out with romantic intentions anyway. That's probably what you're wondering most of all, isn't it? How this first started out?

Well, it wasn't exactly the smoothest of beginnings…

* * *

It was a windy day; birds were singing, sun was shining, the ocean was glistening. I was near the edge of a cliff as I ran for my dear life, away from this monstrous red demon-lady who carried around this giant scary looking scythe that was just begging to decapitate me.

"Stop running!"

Stop running? Yeah, right. Like I was gonna stop and let some Huntress catch me so that I could get sent to jail and be forced to spend the rest of my life doing Dust-mining as a community service. No thank you.

"STOP CHASING ME- EEP!" I yelled back at the little grimm reaper wannabe, but then yelped when I saw that the girl had somehow gotten closer to catching up with me.

"I'll stop chasing you if you stop running!" She argued, looking no worse for wear despite the both of us running so far.

"BUT IF I STOP RUNNING, YOU'LL WEDGE THAT GIANT THING BETWEEN MY NECK!"

"What?! No I won't!" She furrowed her eyebrows as if feeling indignation at the mention of such a thing.

"YES YOU WILL! I'VE SEEN THAT THING CUT THROUGH SOLID BONE!"

"That was, like, one Grimm!"

"A GIANT ALPHA BEOWOLF GRIMM!"

"What's your point?!" She had the audacity to sound confused.

"MY POINT IS, IF THAT THING COULD EASILY SLICE THROUGH IT'S HEAD LIKE IT WAS BUTTER, I DON'T WANT TO FIND OUT WHAT IT'LL DO TO ME!"

"But I'm not going to actually hurt you though! I just want you to stop running!"

"WHY DON'T YOU STOP RUNNING?!"

"Because I want you to stop running first!"

"I'LL STOP IF YOU STOP!"

"How do I know you won't just keep running the moment I stop?!"

"I'M INCREDIBLY TRUSTWORTHY!" Not exactly my most convincing lie, but maybe there was a chance she would fall for it?

"I don't believe you!" Curses, she saw through my deception. "You're going to get tired eventually! Why not make it easy on yourself and stop now while you still can?!"

"I HAPPENED TO BE MY HIGH SCHOOL'S TRACK TEAM CHAMPION FOR TWO YEARS IN A ROW, SO YOU CAN SUCK IT BECAUSE I CAN RUN FOREVER!" I gloated, knowing that I would eventually outlast her in stamina and get away a free man!

"Oh brother, this is taking too long…" I heard her mutter behind me, before suddenly seeing a large collection of red rose petals pass in front of me.

"Wait, what-"

It didn't register that she somehow teleported ahead of me, right up until the point where I saw her scythe embed itself right in my path.

 _Well. That's not fair._

"HOLY CRAP-" In my startled terror, I tried to stop myself and plant my feet down in an attempt to do a one-eighty turnaround.

But, due to the laws of motion of how fast speedy things can't suddenly stop without internally blowing up, I ended up tripping over my feet instead and tumbled directly at her.

"Whoa, wait- stop!" She shouted at me.

I ended up not being able to stop at all, hitting her scythe and getting flung over it as I kept tumbling and tumbling and tumbling-

It was then that I was made aware of how dangerous it was to run near cliffs.

"Watch out!"

That was all I managed to hear her say before feeling the ground disappear before me, sending me into this weird sensation of flight.

Unbeknownst to me, the girl grabbed her scythe and immediately ran after me.

Jumping off the cliff, she quickly grabbed my foot to stop me from falling and stabbed her scythe right into the dirt of the cliff itself in order to slow her descent to a halt.

I, meanwhile, groaned from nausea and dizziness from the trip. The blood rushing up to my head somewhat mitigated the effects, if only ever so slightly.

Regaining my bearings, I looked around to see where I was now. I was somewhat confused from seeing the ocean while looking up to the sky. It was supposed to be the other way around, wasn't it?

"Ugh… What just happened?" I grunted to myself. Looking down, I saw the red hood girl underneath me as she held onto one of my boots, while using her other hand to balance on top of her scythe that was stuck to the ground.

Actually, something about this seemed very wrong to me...

"Don't panic. We're currently dangling off the side of a cliff." She replied calmly enough.

Huh, dangling off the side of a cliff.

…

Oh.

"OH MY GOD WE'RE DANGLING OFF OF A CLIFF" I screamed, full on panic-mode.

She huffed, "At least you stopped running."

While her sense of humor may still have been intact, mine had died the moment I realized the severity of the mess I found myself in.

In some desperate act of stupidity, I decided it would be a good idea to thrash around and scream as she continued to struggle, holding onto me by my boot. "PULLMEUPPULLMEUPPULLMEUP-"

"Hey- HEY! Stop kicking! You're getting to pull us both down if you keep swinging our weight around!"

Seeing logic and reason in her words, I stopped struggling against her and tried to stop panicking. "Okay! Okay okayokayokayokay- Okay, I'm calm! I'm calm! I'm calm. Calm." Taking deep breathes, I felt my heartbeat slow down just a tiny bit enough for me to regain my sanity.

Then, as if fate wanted to tease me a bit, my Grimm mask was loose enough to conveniently fall at that moment. I silently watched as it descended into the abyss of the ocean, and gulped nervously when I couldn't even hear it splash.

Gonna hazard a guess and say that this wasn't an ideal situation for me.

"Just, please don't let go of me!" I begged the girl after seeing a preview of what might be my own fateful demise.

"I'm not gonna let you go, alright? Trust me." The girl reassured me in a clear and leveled manner.

While I felt it strange for her to try to save my life at risk of her own, whether or not I trusted her at this point was kinda moot considering I didn't have a choice in the matter. My life was in her hands, and all I could do was hope to dear god that this girl didn't suddenly go crazy and yell "psyche!"

"O-okay… I don't know why you're doing this, but I'm going to trust you."

"Okay. Good. Glad to know that." She smiled.

…

…

…

After a moment or so of awkward tensions, where I was still dangling off by my leg and her blinking occasionally as she held on to both me and her scythe, I decided to ask the big and obvious question.

"So, how do we get back up to land?"

"I…" She paused nervously, "am still working on that."

"WHAT?! What do you mean you're still working on that?! Can't you just lift us up?!"

"Well, both of my hands are sort of occupied at the moment." She nodded towards the hand that was holding onto my leg, "I didn't really plan ahead when I jumped in to save you. So if you have any suggestions or ideas, I'd be all up for it."

"Great. Just dandy." I groaned, wondering what I did to deserve this.

"Hm… If only I could get ahold of my Scroll. Then I'd be able to call for help." I heard her mutter to herself in thought.

Scroll…

Scroll! That's it!

"I just remembered, I still have my Scroll with me!" I gleefully exclaimed.

You'd think something as obvious as this would be the first thing to think of, but I guess going through a stressful situation as dangling off a cliff will do that to you.

She sighed in relief and asked, "Great! Do you know anyone that you can call for help?"

I carefully pulled my Scroll out of my hoodie's pocket and activated it, "Not really. I think the most appropriate thing for me to do right now is to call for the police to come save us."

"Really? You'd do that?" She asked, "Aren't you worried that they'll arrest you under suspicion of being a member of the White Fang?"

"Well _obviously_ , that's going to be the case." I rolled my eyes, "But it's either this, or death via slam-jamming into the water. Besides, even if we do find some other way to get out of this mess, I'd still end up in jail anyway. You caught me, and I wouldn't be able to outrun you because of your magic teleport skill thing."

"That is a fair point…" She conceded.

Dialing for the police, the Scroll rung for a bit before I heard someone pick up, **"Vale Police Department, what's your emergency?"**

"Oh thank god! You have to come help us out! A girl and I are currently dangling off a-"

My whole body shifted down before suddenly stopping, causing me to bounce and drop my Scroll.

"Nonononono-" I desperately fumbled around into catching the Scroll, an effort proven to be an empty fruit basket as it ended up out of my reach anyway and flew down into the ocean. "NO!"

I looked up to the girl above me and asked, "What did you do?! I just dropped my Scroll into the water now because of that-"

The dirt of the cliff began to crumble a bit and land in my mouth as I was talking, causing me to cough and hack in surprise. A second later, I bounced up as we began to shift downwards again.

With a fearful look, she explained, "Okay- so, please don't start panicking again buuut… I think my scythe is starting to slip."

...

Wiping some dirt out of my eyes, I said, "I was hoping you would tell me that was an earthquake instead…"

She blanched with confusion, before shouting, "B- Wha- In this situation, how does an earthquake seem like a better scenario than us slipping off?!"

"I don't know! Maybe the thought that Mother Nature is going to be the cause of my death is somehow more comforting to me instead of my own god damn weight-" Realizing I was going off on a tangent, I shifted back our focus to the problem, "WHATEVER, can't you just stab it back into the cliff again and make it firmer?!"

"Are you crazy?! I can't just pull it out and then stab it back in again!"

"Why not?!"

"Because that's not-" she began to shout, before pausing in thought. Then she muttered, "Actually, it is physically possible if I do it fast enough. That's not a bad ide-"

And then we were falling.

With a scream, the girl lost her grip on both her scythe and my foot as we began to plummeted to our doom.

The first thing that I thought to do besides making sure I was screaming at the lowest possible pitch, to ensure I died while still sounding as masculine as possible, was to flap my arms like a bird in a desperate attempt to fly.

Despite all known laws of aviation, I think it was actually starting to help slow my descent somewhat. The girl fell past me while she was flailing around in terror, with her scythe spinning through the air just behind.

Watching the scythe passing by gave me an extremely dumb idea that I decided to follow through with. Frog stroking my way through the air, I did my best to fling myself after the girl's scythe and grab it in my hands.

After successfully hugging it in my arms, I did what any sane person would do and proceed to divebomb downwards in order to catch up with the girl before we both splattered against the water.

Holding her scythe with one hand, I reached out to her with the other, "QUICK, HOLD ON TO ME!"

Without any arguments, she latched onto my arm and clenched tightly.

Then, I copied the move that she did earlier to save my life and swung the scythe's blade into the cliff without much thought.

The blade struck and wedge itself inside the dirt just as planned, as our fall came to a sudden halt just a few dozen feet above the water. With gravity still pulling us down though, I could feel the strain of the girl's weight combined with mine as I struggled to hold us up.

"AAGH-" I groaned under the stress.

 _HOW DID SHE MAKE THIS LOOK SO EASY?!_

"Wow, you actually did it!" She laughed in disbelief at the fact that we both somehow survived, only to frown when she saw my face turning red. "You alright?"

"Never trained… upper body strength… so much regret…" I managed to squeeze out through gritted teeth.

"Oh!" She hurriedly started climbing up my arm, which made the strain even worse and hurt like hell, before finally wrapping an arm around my shoulder and grabbed on to her scythe. Now sharing our weight, she asked "There. Feel better?"

Sighing slightly in relief of the alleviated weight, I whined, "I think I might have dislocated my shoulder…"

"Sorry…" She gave an apologetic smile. If smiles could help, I would've felt much better. But it didn't. It didn't help at all.

"Whatever…" I groaned from the sore strain once more before focusing my attention to the situation. "Okay... We somehow lived through that nightmare. I don't feel like running anymore, so you got any ideas to get us out of here?"

"Hm…" She furrowed her eyebrows in thought before lighting up with an idea, "I still have my Scroll! I can call for help!"

She began to use her free hand to rummage around her belt, searching around for a bit and finally pulling out her scroll.

"Ahah! Got it!" She cheered.

Right as she was in the middle of activating it though, she managed to somehow fumble with it before it slipped out of her hand and dropped down into the ocean along with my Scroll.

"Ack! No!" She helplessly reached out for it, only to realize that it was already too far away. "Ugh! Butterfingers!"

I could only stare at the ocean below with a deadpanned expression, "So that's it then. We're stuck here forever until we die. How neat."

"Not necessarily…" She closed her eyes for a bit, before looking at me and asked, "Do you get easily motion sick?"

"Motion sick?" I repeated incredulously, "Lady, I just fell off a cliff and almost died free falling about two-thirds of the way down in order to save both of our butts. If I didn't get motion sick from that, I never will."

"Okay, good. Just wondering." She vaguely stated, removing a magazine from her scythe and dropping into the ocean. Then she carefully pulled out another one from her utility belt, this one with a black cross insignia on it, and inserted it into her weapon to load up the chamber.

"Uh… How is reloading your scythe thingy going to help us get out of here?"

"Just a little something I brewed up at home. Ever seen Black Dust used in action?"

"Black Dust?" I asked, "You mean, like, the stuff they use to fuel up the Bullheads?"

She smirked, "The proper term for it is Gravity Dust."

Gravit- Oh.

Oh god damn it.

"I can already tell this is going to suck…" I sighed.

"Don't worry! I've done this plenty of times before, and I've only messed up twice!" She cheerfully exclaimed.

If that was suppose to fill me with confidence over the idea of flying back up via explosive bullets, it didn't. But it's not like I even had any other option, so screw it.

"Okay, get behind my back and wrap your arms around me. This is going to be a bumpy ride!" She told me in a tone that sounded almost _too_ excited for my tastes.

My god, she _was_ crazy, wasn't she?

Hesitantly doing as she told me to, I let her take command of her scythe as I got into position and wrapped myself around her waist as best I could with my injured arm.

I was startled a bit when she suddenly went stiff and squeaked quietly. "What? Something wrong?" I asked her.

"Uh- um… Arms above my shoulders please?" She stuttered.

I raised an eyebrow at her randomly specific request, "Does it really matter where I put my arms around you?"

"Yes!" She squeaked again, clearly uncomfortable with _something_.

Deciding not to argue, I did as she asked and repositioned my arms around her shoulders instead.

Sighing in relief, she went back to her normal-ish excited behavior and happily asked me, "Okay, ready?"

"About as ready as the next g-"

 **BANGBANGBANGBANGBANG**

"-AAAAAAAAAHHH!"

With a rather theatrical three point pose at the end, the girl was able to land the both of us back on solid ground looking no worse for wear.

Correction, she landed on the ground and looked no worse for wear. I was pale white and collapsed on the ground breathing heavily from shock, with a dislocated arm limply doing its own thing.

Seeing my disconcerted state, she kneeled beside me with concern, "You alright? I didn't go too fast for you, did I?"

With a moan filled with agony, I exhausted all of my breath into one final weak scream that could barely register as a noise any man would make. "Honestly?" I rasped, "I don't even care anymore. I'm just glad that we both managed to come out of this alive. That's pretty much all that matters now."

She began laughing and sat right beside me, "Yeah… now that the adrenaline is starting to wear off, I'm feeling pretty beat."

Oh, **she** was the one feeling beat, was she?

I playfully scoffed, "Excuse me? Who was the one who had to save both of our butts from falling to our deaths and ended up getting an injured shoulder because he never bothered doing a proper pull-up session since grade-school?"

She hummed curiously as she tilted her head. "Yeah… thanks again for that. But… why did you do that anyway?"

I glanced at her, "Do what?"

"You could have stolen my scythe away from me while we were falling and used it to only save yourself. Heck, you could have dropped me at anytime while we were holding onto to each other. Easily get rid of the Huntress after your tail and everyone would be none the wiser about it."

"Don't give me any ideas now." I half chuckled, half wheezed.

"My point is, you had the option to let someone who was hunting you down fall to their death and earn a chance to get away scot-free. Instead, you actually chose to save my life as you were risking your own. Why?"

I raised an eyebrow at her question, not knowing how to answer considering I hadn't even put that much thought for why I wanted to save her, despite her Huntress occupation and my White Fang allegiance.

That reminded me, actually…

Sitting up, I began to question her for myself, "Speaking of which, the same thing could be asked for you! You, a human girl, saw me, a Faunus who was a member of the White Fang, roll off a cliff to my death... and the first thing you think to do is to jump in after me? Like, seriously?"

"Is there something wrong with that? What does me being a human girl have to do with why I saved you?"

"Well… I don't know? I just sort of expected you to consider it a wasteful effort trying to save one measly grunt of the White Fang. Why bother if you're not gonna get anything good out of it?"

"Well that's a depressing way to look at it," She muttered disapprovingly, before speaking up, "I didn't save you because I thought that I'd get something good out of it, I saved you because it was the right thing to do! I'm a Huntress, it's my job to protect people and maintain peace!"

"And when you say people, that includes people like me?"

"Yes! I don't make exceptions or divide certain people, I believe everyone is worth saving!" She shouted.

I looked at her, feeling a bit surprised after hearing her say that. Not in the fact that she said it, but the way it felt like she firmly believed it without any sense of doubt. Maybe it was just my own personal history with Humans being dicks in general, but I never thought I would meet a human girl that would be so...

"If you thought that I was the type that would only save you for my own personal gain, then why did you bother to save me when I was in trouble? That's the part I don't get." She pointed at me with an accusing stare.

Hm… You know, that was a pretty good question. Why _did_ I bother to help her, when moments ago, she was trying to hunt me down like a dog in a forest?

Maybe…?

I hummed in thought, before deciding to go with, "Guess I'm just the type of guy that doesn't sit well with the thought of killing someone, even if they are a human. Letting anyone die on purpose just feels… inhuman? For lack of a better word?"

"Even if it means you might die trying to save them?" She raised an eyebrow in suspicion.

I shrugged. "Same as you then."

She silently studied me, her eyes wandering around as if to capture my entire face.

I instinctively reached up to position my mask, only to remember that I dropped it back when we were still dangling off the cliff. Without anything to protect my identity, you'd think I would have reacted more worriedly. But something told me that it didn't really matter anymore. Not like a mask was going to save me once I got arrested anyway.

So we just sat there and inquisitively stared at each other, neither one of us knowing exactly what to do. Meeting each other was an unlucky coincidence, but with everything that just happened between us, I was starting to see this girl in a new light. Maybe she might not be as bad as I assumed she would be?

That was when she loosened up her expression and gave me a small smile, asking matter of factly, "You're not a bad person, are you?"

Having no clue how to respond to that, I could only shrug again, "I'd like to think that I'm not."

Then she chuckled to herself, "I guess you're not then."

Moving to stand up, she dusted off her clothes and stretched her arms out. Sighing in relief, she began to wordlessly walk away, much to my confusion.

Before she could leave, I yelled out to her, "Hey! Red lady, where you going? Aren't I being arrested under suspicion of being a member of the White Fang?"

She looked back and told me, "Just forget about it! Consider it a thanks for choosing to do what you felt was right!"

"But are you sure you're allowed to do this? I mean, isn't this sort of against the law or something?"

"Probably... but you know what?" She explained as she flipped her hood up and walked away, "It just doesn't feel like the right thing to do at the moment."

Huh. Well, that was pleasantly unexpected.

When she was finally gone, it was only now that I realized that I hadn't even found out her name. Which was a shame, because I think I was starting to warm up to her. She was pretty okay for a human.

Maybe there might be hope for them yet in the future.

* * *

"Sooo… that was pretty…um..." The wolf Faunus started off awkwardly enough.

"Yeah…" Ruby agreed wholeheartedly.

"I mean… it was sort of… um…" He scratched the back of his neck, unsure how to use his words.

"Yep…" Ruby nodded back in understanding.

With the Carnival ending after the show was over, the both of them walked out of there with only one consensus in their minds.

 _This was a terrible first date._

The boy began to rant his heart out about the event, "Like, the whole thing was such a-"

Ruby interrupted with an indignant, "Right?! None of it was even remotely funny! They even had the gall to-"

"Oh my god, I know!" He grunted as he facepalmed, "Then when they introduced the clowns! God, were they such-"

"I feel so bad for those poor elephants! And they did that in front of kids!"

"What were they thinking when they called out the acrobatic team?! Someone in the audience could have died from that stunt!"

"And the whole time, the announcer was just sitting there and making those insensitive jokes at their expense!"

It was needless to say that neither of them had a good time.

"I am never going to another one of their carnivals ever again." He proclaimed.

"Agreed." She nodded firmly.

And then there was silence.

 _This was a terrible first date._

Ruby didn't exactly expect her first date with a boy to be anything magical. If anything, she sort of knew it might end up being a mess. But that was only because she thought she would somehow screw things up with her own introverted tendencies.

She wasn't sure if today would be considered better or worse than what she hoped.

"Hey, uh…"

Ruby perked up and glanced at her date as he sheepishly scratched his head.

"I was hoping that today would have ended up on a high note instead of what we got. Sorry for making you go through all of that…"

"It's not your fault." She reassured with a sad smile, "You couldn't have known how bad it was going to be."

"Yeah, well… I pretty much chose this over a movie date because I thought going to the movie theater as a first date would be unimaginative and generic. So, serves me right for trying something daring, am I right?" He chuckled embarrassingly.

"I don't mind going to the movies though."

"Oh." He said simply, "Well. Sucks for me then."

Ruby giggled a bit, before an idea popped up in her head. With an excited gleam, she spoke up, "Listen, we've got plenty of time left before the day ends. We can still turn this around to end on a more positive note."

"Oh yeah? How do you think we'll manage that?"

Grinning, Ruby ran ahead of him as she turned around with her arms up to cheer, "Let's go back to the ice cream parlor!"

The boy blinked in surprise, before asking, "Really? Are you sure? I mean, we already go there every Sunday to hang out."

"Yeah, because we always have the most fun over there! Who cares if it's the same place where we always meet up?" She declared.

The Faunus mulled over it for a bit before he conceded, "Hm, alright. I see your point. Not like we have any other better ideas anyway, so why not?"

Yeah. Besides, this would make a much better end to the date. Just him and Ruby, hanging out for fun like they usually did. So what if it wasn't as romantic as they were hoping for? There was nothing wrong with that. In the end, they would still be spending the day together. That was all that mattered to her.

* * *

"Tank for me. Tank for me! Their healer is getting away!"

"My ult's not off it's cooldown yet! I can't taunt them!"

"Okay nevermind, she got back behind their tower. Let's just run back to bottom- Wait, watch out that guy has a stun!"

The two young souls clicked and tapped away at their game as they mindlessly devoured their minty chocolate flavored snacks. So focused on their game, neither had noticed that the sun outside had already gone down to make room for the broken moon to rise for the night.

Ruby haphazardly gulped down her mint milkshake, not caring how it spilled a bit over her clothes. "Ooh! Keep pushing, the entire enemy team's distracted at mid!"

As they continued to play, a middle-aged man in the background walked past them and turned around the "open" sign on the front doors.

He looked over at the two lovebirds and rolled his eyes, before jokingly asked them, "So, you kids gonna be here all night? I need to know beforehand or else I might accidently lock you inside the shop."

"Sorry, Mr. Cambridge! We're almost done with this match!" Ruby replied without taking her eyes off the screen.

"We'll get out of your hair soon, boss!" Her date reassured him with a quick wave of his hand, before he went back to mashing on the keyboard. "Enemy warrior TPing back! Ready up your silence!"

"Got it!"

The man rolled his eyes with a warm, "Kids these days…"

After that, he began cleaning up tables and sanitizing seats as the duo shouted commands at each other.

"I got his attention! Rush him, Ruby!"

"Silenced, slice and dice combo, aaaaaaaand- Kill secured!"

"Okay, keep pushing bottom!"

What kind of newfangled game required them to shout at each other so much? It wasn't like they were playing a competitive sport or anything. Or maybe they were?

Peeking over one of their shoulders, he could see them control two oversized medieval knights as they led a group of tiny soldiers forward into battle. Despite the both of them clicking the mouse around like crazy, they didn't seem to be doing anything other than move their characters back and forth in the line of soldiers.

Scratching his head in defeat, he accepted the fact that he was too out of touch to "get" anything the new generation were into these days.

So instead of figuring out anymore about their game, he decided to ask them a question about their date as he was cleaning. "Weren't you two supposed to be on a date at the circus or something?"

"Yeah, but the date was a bust." The Faunus boy casually replied.

Ruby then spoke, "The carnival ended up being too weird and upsetting for us to enjoy. We ended up deciding to come back here to end our date instead."

"Out of all the places to continue your date, you chose the one place where you two hang out frequently enough already? Aren't you guys bored with this place yet?"

"Mm-mm." The young lad mumbled.

"No _p_ e." Ruby popped for emphasis.

The aging parlor shop owner hummed to himself before shrugging away their strange antics, summing it up as, "Youthful stubbornness or something."

"The entire enemy team is TPing back!" Ruby shouted with panic.

"Keep attacking the core, I'll hold them off!"

The two younglings began mashing the keyboard buttons furiously for a few more seconds, before they finally cheered in unison at the sound of the announcer declaring their victory.

" **Mantle's Dust Core has fallen. Atlesian Knights win!"**

"Haha! Yes!"

"We did it! We reached B-rank!"

Getting out of their seats, they high-fived each other and jumped for joy in each other's arms like a pair of overly excited teenage girls at a boy-band pop concert.

While Cambridge Mint was not the type of man to spoil the innocent fun between two young hearts in love, it was late and he really needed to close up shop.

So he cleared his throat rather loudly in order to get their attention, now that they were apparently done with their game. "AHEM!"

The two stopped cheering and turned their attentions towards him in confusion.

"Think you two can take this celebration outside? It's closing time." He pointed towards the exit.

With embarassed mutterings of apologies, _"Sorry boss." "Thanks again for the service, Mr. Cambridge."_ the two kids stepped outside as he finished up his cleaning.

* * *

Ruby walked up to a lamppost as she stretched her arms up, giving a sigh in satisfaction. "That was a good match. I haven't fought so hard in a game in months!"

Her date went to stand right next to her as he chuckled, "Definitely more hectic than I anticipated."

The two of them began to look up at the night sky and stared into the shattered moon, admiring the sight for what it was worth.

Secretly behind the window of the shop, Mint peeked through the blinds of his window in order to check up on the two and see what they were going to do.

The wolf Faunus's ears flickered a bit as he rubbed the back of his neck out of awkward tension, "Hey, Ruby?"

"Yeah?" She glanced at him curiously.

"Sorry again for the crummy start of our first date. If only I did a little bit of research or even picked something else, maybe we would have ended up having a better time…"

"Are you seriously still hung over about that?" She frowned, "I already said that it wasn't your fault. You had no idea what was going to happen!"

He sighed depressingly, "I know, but… I just wanted this date to be better somehow. I wanted this to be, like, a memorable thing for us to share, you know? Something to look back on in the future and to laugh about. But I couldn't make it live up to expectation…"

"Hey," she turned to face him, "I want you to look at me."

The boy looked up at her, staring into her silver eyes. Eyes filled with a sense of warmth and determination.

"Answer me honestly." She began, "Did you have a fun time with me today?"

"Well…" He quirked an eyebrow at the question, "Yeah, of course."

"And so did I." She smiled at him with a glowing expression, "That should be all that matters in the end. I really don't care how this date started out. Sure, it wasn't how we imagined it to be, but later on we were able to flip it around and turn it into an experience that only people like us can fully appreciate."

"Ruby…"

"Because that's the thing!" Ruby continued, "Even if all of our dates ended up being complete disasters in the future, I'd still be having fun and laughing about it because I would be together with you! As long as we're still together, I'll be-"

Ruby stopped her train of thought and suddenly felt all of her confidence sapped away as she realized what she was about to admit out loud. She squirmed in place for a bit, looking down from him as she blushed.

She wasn't ready to admit her feelings yet, it felt too soon to go about it like this… weren't they just acting like friends a moment ago? Aren't first dates supposed to be things where you get to know your date better and then slowly start having deeper feelings for them?

But she already knew him. She knew everything about him, just like he knew everything about her. When it really came down to it, both of their first date together had already taken place unofficially a few weeks ago when they first started hanging out. As friends. But then as time went by, their friendship really nurtured and evolved to become something else, didn't it? It was the only reason why she would agree to him asking her out in the first place…

Because she…

"I'm happy when we're together like this. I like you." She finished.

She began to poke her fingers together like the shy and socially awkward girl that she was, hoping she hadn't accidently scared him off with her confession.

Ruby looked up, checking to see if he was still there in front of her. To her relief, he was. His cheeks were blushing brighter than lights on a fire truck.

"I… Um… Er… That is to say… Uh…" He stammered, his wolf ears standing straight up in embarrassment, or maybe excitement.

In spite of it all, Ruby began to laugh when she saw his reaction. It made her feel a lot more comfortable, knowing that she wasn't the only one feeling so awkward and embarrassed from all of this.

After a while, he began laughing as well, albeit nervously and with confusion.

Finally settling down, their conversation transitioned back to their awkward silences again.

…

He took a deep breath, and stood up straight as he stared face to face with her, "I'm glad I met you, Ruby. I always felt lucky how we managed to meet each other again after that day."

"Yeah." She nodded in agreement, "I feel the same way. Despite all odds, we ended up getting along pretty well, didn't we?"

"Could you imagine if I wasn't working my shift on that day?"

"Or if I decided to pick something other than ice cream for a snack break?"

 _None of this would have ever happened…_

It was a depressing thought, for sure. To think, there was a possible chance neither of them would have met the other for more than once in their lives.

But it was a thought that they'd never have to worry about. They **did** meet again. They **did** get along. They **did** become friends.

They _will_ become more.

"I like you too." He finally confessed.

Ruby had to suppress the urge to pull her hood over her head to hide herself. She was getting too excited over this.

"I'm glad."

...

"I was wondering… Um…" the boy mumbled, "Even though our first date was… kinda weak at the start… you wanna do this again sometimes? Doing dates, I mean. Like, officially."

"Officially?" She tilted her head.

"You know… boyfriend and girlfriend…" Feeling unsatisfied with himself, he cleared his throat and started over again, this time with more confidence and less wavering in his voice. "Ruby… I'd like to go steady with you. Please be mine?"

Ruby fell silent at the request, not expecting him to be as forward as he was. Once the shock wore off though, she could feel the giddiness inside of her rising up and almost threatening to take control. Her face heated up, her breath drew short, everything felt like a rush to her as adrenaline pumped in her veins.

Knowing that she would start freaking out soon and not wanting to do so in front of him, she decided to be quick about it before the situation got out of hand.

So without much thought, she zipped right in front of him and pecked him on the cheek, red rose petals bursting out from her as she did so.

"I'll see you again next week…"

And that was all she could say before she flashed away in order to hide herself from embarrassment, only leaving behind her signature calling card of a bajillion rose petals scattered around him.

Using her semblance, she ran all the way back to her Beacon dormitory room in an instant, unable to wipe her small grin away no matter how hard she tried..

Meanwhile, standing in the middle of the sidewalk with eyes as wide as saucers and grinning like a complete idiot, was the boy. So transcended was he in his blissful moment, he steadily rubbed his fingers to feel where she kissed him.

Without uttering another word, he walked slowly through Vale's moonlight and pumped his fist up to the sky in silent victory.

Behind the scenes, Cambridge Mint; owner of the ice cream parlor, who was watching all of this as it transpired, chuckled warmly as he shook his head.

"Ah, young love. The rules may have changed, but the end result is still the same."


	2. How They've Gotten to Know Each Other

"Scooper Boy! I need two large chocolate cones, on the double!"

"Coming boss!"

"Scooper Boy! A bowl of vanilla with chocolate icing and sprinkles!"

"On it!"

"Scooper Boy! Rocky Road, extra large cone!"

"Aye aye, sir!"

* * *

"Thank you, come again soon!" Cambridge Mint happily waved at a young couple as they exited the shop.

It was two hours before closing time, and there were only a handful of customers left that were still sitting in their booths.

Using the downtime to catch my breath, I leaned back against a wall and wiped the sweat off my brow. "Sheesh, busy day today. You'd think working at an ice cream parlor would keep me cool from the hot weather, but I still feel like I'm a cooked lobster in here…"

"Really? I don't feel any different." The boss glanced at me with a curious eyebrow raised.

"Gee, I wonder why that is." I deadpanned, staring at him as he cheerfully sat still in one spot behind the cash register, which he hadn't moved from since the entire goddamn day.

He chuckled, "I'm just teasing. Alright, since you've been working so hard, I'm willing to let you take a break for the rest of the day."

"You don't mind?" I asked him.

"I can handle the last few hours by myself. Feel free to go home, or do whatever it is you kids do when you have free time." He waved me away.

Breathing a sigh of relief, I gratefully told him, "Thanks boss!" Before going in the back of the shop to change out of my uniform and grab my stuff.

As I changed clothes, I heard the familiar jingle of the door bell. Out of habit, I almost head out to get ready to make another order, but then remembered that I was just allowed a break.

"He can handle this one then." I told myself, finishing up.

"Well howdy there, little miss! What can I do for you?" I heard the boss greet whoever came in.

"Hi! I heard this place has mint flavored milkshakes?"

My ears perked up as I heard the customer's voice. Something about it seemed familiar… though, I couldn't quite to place it...

"Yes, ma'am! Care to try one?"

"Sure. I never heard of a milkshake that was mint flavored before, so I was curious. What's it like?"

Hm… No, I definitely know that voice from somewhere…

"Well, imagine eating mint ice cream. Now imagine if that ice cream was a milkshake. Speaks for itself, doesn't it?"

"Yeah, I guess it does." I heard the girl giggle.

Jeez, even the way she laughed struck my memories somehow…

"Alrighty, I'll go get you a glass then."

As I finished switching out my work uniform to a casual hoodie, curiosity got the better of me. I couldn't help but check out who the girl was and why she sounded so familiar.

"Here you are, missy. One small mint milkshake, served with love and tenderness from the Mint Factory itself." The boss said, handing the glass to the customer.

Over the counter, the girl picked it up and thanked him before sipping it.

The moment I saw her red hood and cheerful face, I paused in my step.

My eyes widened in surprise, and I tactlessly called out, "You?!"

She glanced over to me while still sipping her drink, before turning away to ignore me. Only to then spit her drink out and do a double take, "You?!"

"You!" I balked.

"You!" She pointed at me.

"Ahem."

Our focus was taken away as we paid our attention to the now mint-drenched Cambridge Mint. I flinched at the sight, while Red-lady covered her mouth in shock.

The boss steadily wiped his eyes dry from the mess, looking bemused. Facing towards me, he asked, "So I take it you two know each other, then?"

* * *

 _The First Week_

"Here ya go. One small cup of mint-flavored milkshake, on the house." I set the drink down on the table, before taking a seat across from her.

She politely nodded and took the drink, "You didn't have to give me a free drink, you know."

"Don't worry about it," I waved away her concerns, "It's the least I can do after what you did for me the last time we met. Besides, one of the perks of working here is that I get half-off of everything that's on the menu. Just enjoy it."

Taking my advice, she slurped up her milkshake with content.

"Taste good?" I asked.

She gulped, before replying, "Yeah, it's delicious." She inquisitively looked around the place, studying the ceiling decoration and the menu theme. "So," she started off quietly, "this is your day job then? Not what I expected from someone in the White Fang."

I shrugged, "It's a living. Being part of a movement doesn't exactly pay the rent, you know?"

"I guess…" She paused to look at the boss, before asking, "So does that mean the owner is also…?"

"Oh!" I realized what she meant, and cleared things up, "Actually, no. He's a human, like you. Doesn't even know that I'm part of the White Fang."

"Really? You're fine with working for a human? But I thought-"

"Listen, I know it seems weird for me to work for him even though he's a human. But the thing is, I don't hate _all_ humans. Just the majority of them. The ones that are composed entirely out of racist dickheads, basically." I explained, "I'm totally cool with the ones that don't care whether I'm a Faunus or not."

"Oh." She hummed, taking another sip of her milkshake. "You know, there are more nice humans than there are racist ones. The majority of us aren't like what you think."

I gave a dry chuckle at that. "Sure."

"You don't believe me?" She frowned.

"No, I believe that's what you think." I answered, before elaborating, "The problem is though, you and I have experienced different lives. I'm sure you probably believe that the majority of people you've met were kind-hearted people who couldn't possibly mistreat others. But then again, you weren't born a Faunus."

"What do you mean?"

"Chances are, if you were born with wolf ears or a monkey's tail, and you ever came across those people again… they'd probably treat you like dirt." I sighed, "You were lucky that you were born a human. Everyone actually treats you as an equal out of common courtesy. That's why you probably think the majority of humans are all nice and considerate. Me? I rarely ever have that luxury with strangers."

"Is that what you really believe?" She asked sadly.

"I believe that's what I think." I answered simply.

And then there was silence.

We sat there and looked away from each other, an awkward pause in the air that was heavy enough to bring down the mood.

She sat there quietly as she finished her drink in thought, only occasionally glancing up to look at me. I could only imagine what was going through her mind.

Pulling out my Scroll, I checked the time and decided that now was a good time to leave before the mood got any worse.

Sitting up, I said my farewells, "Welp, it was nice to see you again, Red-lady."

"Where are you going?" She looked surprised to see me leave so soon.

"Going home. I'm taking an early leave for the day." I told her.

Before I could leave, however, the girl grabbed my sleeve just as I was walking past her, "Wait!"

"Hm? What is it?"

"Are you going to be here next week? Sundays are my free days, so I think I can probably come visit more often."

"Visit? You mean you want to come by here to visit me again?" I raised an eyebrow.

She nodded.

"Er- why?"

"Because…" She paused, before looking at me with a pleading expression, "I mean, we're friends now, aren't we?"

Are we? Never really considered it…

"I guess we are?" I said in an unsure tone.

Hearing that, she gave me a wide smile, "Great! So that means you don't mind if I come by every now and then?"

"I don't see why not, but why do you-"

"Just to talk, you know? Everybody needs to have a friend to talk to every once in awhile." She explained, "My name is Ruby Rose. It's nice to meet you!"

"Well then. Nice to meet you too, Ruby." Despite how confused I was, I couldn't help but pleasantly smile back at her. She was a pretty weird girl, but her outgoing personality seemed to be kinda infectious. "So I guess I'll see you next week then?"

"Count on it!" She cheered as she smiled brightly at me.

Hm... something to look forward to for next week. Don't know why she would go through the trouble to make the time just to spend it on me. Maybe she felt pity for me? Maybe she found it sad that I had such negative views on the majority of the human race? Maybe she thought I was lonely because of it?

Meh. Either way, it wouldn't hurt to get to know her a bit.

* * *

 _The Second Week._

 ***Jingle-Jangle***

I looked towards the door and paused in surprise. "Huh. You actually came back to visit."

"I said I would, didn't I?" She smiled.

Facing towards the boss, I asked, "Hey Mint, do you think I can-"

He interrupted me before I could finish asking, "Go ahead. It's a slow day today."

* * *

"Why I joined the White Fang?" I repeated the question to myself.

"Yeah. What happened in your life that lead you to join them?" She asked me, licking her mint ice cream cone.

I hummed in thought.

"You don't have to answer it if it's too personal. I just thought I'd ask."

"No no, it's fine." I reassured her, "You can probably already figure out the reason I joined them in the first place. Got sick of seeing all the mistreatment that Faunus were put through. Got tired of being belittled and shunned just because we were born with animal features, something none of us had any control over in the first place. There was so much injustice in the world, and I was so angry having to see all of it happen right in front of my eyes…"

I sighed, "What I was angry about the most was that I didn't know what to do about it. I felt powerless, and weak. Pointless. After all, what can a single Faunus kid do to fix all of this? But then a friend of mine told me about this group called the White Fang. He said how they were a group dedicated to bringing equality and justice to all the Faunus in the world. How they planned to stop the mistreatment and exploitation of Faunus to make the world a better place. Obviously, when I heard that they were accepting recruits, you can bet your bottom dollar that I went to apply as fast as I could. 'I finally found a way to help,' I said to myself, 'I can finally make a difference!'"

"So yeah…" I sighed while leaning back, "That's pretty much what led me to join the White Fang."

"I see…" She took another bite out of her ice cream in thought, "Doesn't it feel wrong, though?"

"How do you mean?"

"I mean… You hurt people, and steal from them. I know you're doing what you think is right, but don't you ever feel the tiniest bit of regret? Have you ever wondered if you're attacking innocent people?"

"I wouldn't say that I go out and attack them…" I told her, "Besides, that's not really my thing. I don't hurt people and I don't ever plan to, human or otherwise. Really, all I'm trying to do is scare these guys straight so that they don't mistreat another Faunus ever again. And if I ever steal from someone, it's only from people who I know deserve it. Eye for an eye, you know?"

"An eye for an eye makes the world go blind…" She recited.

"Then maybe it'll be worth it to make the world blind." I humorlessly chuckled, "After all, if everyone was blind, nobody could judge others for how they looked anymore. We'd live in true equality…"

Ruby frowned at me in disappointment, but stayed silent since she couldn't come up with a response to that.

* * *

 _The Third Week_

"So if you hate most humans, how do you deal with the majority of human customers that must come by daily?" Ruby asked as she forked a mint banana split into her mouth,

"Like any other rational and normal person. Don't make a scene and serve the customer to the best of my ability." I answered obviously. "I don't sneer at them or say that they're not welcome simply because of how they look. Simple as that."

"Has anyone ever tried to start something though? Your wolf ears are kind of a dead giveaway, no offense…"

"None taken." I shrugged off, "As to your question, I go out of my way to prevent something like that from happening in the first place. I wear a hat that comes with the work uniform. Covers up my ears, nice and comfy." I gently smoothed my hands over my wolf ears, and they flickered out of instinct. "Just because I hate most humans doesn't mean I'm gonna burden my boss with them. He's a nice guy doing an honest living. I'll be damned before I let his reputation and business get tanked because a rogue Faunus employee of his lost his temper one day and punched a customer in the face."

"Oh." She blinked, "That's considerate of you. Hiding your identity away just for the safety of others…"

"It's the least I can do for him. He's one of the rare few, just like you." I smiled at her.

She smiled back, only more depressingly than I hoped for. "I wish you didn't need to do that…"

I hummed in appreciation for the comment.

Every time we talked, I always felt like I was bringing the mood down. Definitely needed to fix that if she was going to keep visiting.

I'll ask more about her the next time we meet.

* * *

 _The next week…_

"Your friend isn't coming today?" The boss asked me as he washed the dishes.

I looked at the door expectantly, almost hoping that she was just running late and would show up at any moment.

So far, she hasn't.

I wondered if she had gotten tired of talking to me?

My disappointment must have been obvious, since Mint came over to pat me on the shoulder and reassured me, "I'm sure she's just running an errand or something and couldn't find the time for today. Didn't you say that she was training to become a Huntress?"

I nodded.

Yeah, that was probably it.

* * *

 _The Fourth Week_

 ***Jingle-Jangle***

"I'm here!"

I looked over at the door and smiled when I saw her familiar face again. "Oh, Ruby! Nice to see you back!"

"There we go!" The boss cheered, "We were wondering where you disappeared to, little missy."

"Sorry," she sheepishly rubbed her neck, "I had a mission assigned last week. I wanted to come by later, but the mission ended up taking longer than I thought."

"No worries. Go have a seat in the usual spot, I'll catch up with you after I'm done-"

Mint interrupted me, "Actually kid, how about you take the day off? In fact, every Sunday can be your day off."

I widened my eyes in surprise, before asking, "Are you sure, boss?"

"No skin off of my back." He shrugged. "I've worked the counter alone before. I can do it again for a day a week."

Huh. Sweet.

* * *

"By the way Ruby, you're a Huntress in training, right?" I asked as I sipped my mint milkshake.

"Yeah. What about it?"

"Well, I was wondering what academy you go to. I don't know too much about Hunters in general, so I figure I should get to know one while I still have the chance."

"Oh, well," she swallowed a spoon of her sundae, before answering, "I was originally a student in Signal Academy, but now I attend Beacon instead."

"Beacon? You mean that famous school on top of the mountain that overlooks Vale?" I blinked in astonishment.

"Yepyep."

"Seriously? But you can't be any older than me. Aren't you sixteen?"

"Fifteen, actually." She corrected.

"Fifteen years old and you've already graduated your preliminary schools to move on to a prestigious academy like Beacon? Sheesh! I never realized you were a prodigy."

She fidgeted in her seat uncomfortably and mumbled, "I'm not, actually. Just really lucky."

Modest type, huh? Alright, I won't push it then.

Switching topics, I decided to ask, "What's it like being a Hunter? I went to a civilian school, so I wouldn't know. Is there really a difference besides learning about fighting and weapons?"

"Hm…" She tilted her head in thought, "I'm not really sure. I don't think so, at least. I go to school and take classes like any other student. I study for tests and do my homework. I train and hone my body to become the ultimate fighting machine so that I could be strong enough in order to protect mankind from the Grimm-"

 _Well, that's one difference._ I sweatdropped.

"I can't really think of anything, though. Honestly, I feel like Huntsmen and Huntresses are just regular people that grew up in a slightly different way." She shrugged, before finishing her ice cream.

"What about your super powers?"

"My what?"

"You know, that thing that all of you guys can do." I explained poorly. When she started to look at me funny, I decided to rephrase the question, "You remember when you were chasing me near that cliff, and you turned into a bunch of rose petals in order to catch up with me?"

She blinked in confusion, before having a look of realization, "Oh! You're talking about semblances! I guess it is kinda like a superpower." She chuckled, "That's actually not how my semblance works. My ability is the power to control my speed. I can run faster than anything you could probably think of."

"Cool." I nodded, impressed. "Why'd you choose to get that over any of the other powers though?"

"It's actually not something I get to choose," She explained. "See, whenever a person has their aura unlocked, they awaken to a unique semblance within themselves. It's completely random, and no two semblances are exactly alike. Everyone gets a different one, and nothing can influence what they end up getting."

"Oh… that must suck for people who get the short end of the stick then." I commented.

"Heh, yeah. I got pretty lucky with something that ended up being useful to my fighting skills."

"What about the rose petal thing though? Do they show up whenever you use your speed powers? What's up with that?"

"I'm… actually not sure," she scratched her head. "They've always done that since day one. I never figured out why they appear whenever I use my semblance. But they look cool, so I don't really mind." She shrugged.

"Really weird..." I leaned forward in interest, "Tell me more about Hunters. What's your life at Beacon like?"

She hummed, "Well… let's see…"

* * *

 _The Fifth Week_

"So let's say I ended up getting my aura unlocked," I hypothesized, "What do you think my semblance would be?"

She took a bite out of her minty chocolate chip ice cream sandwich, before shrugging, "Well, seeing how everyone's chance of getting a specific semblance is completely random, I have absolutely no idea." She swallowed, and then asked, "If you could choose though, what would you want as your semblance?"

I closed my eyes, concentrating deeply as I seriously considered what I would want as a semblance if I could ever have one.

In the end, I decided to go with a simple one. "Werewolf powers. Definitely."

"Werewolf powers?"

"I totally want to shapeshift into an actual giant wolf. I always wondered what it would be like if I could just transform my body and try my life as a wolf, even if it's just for a single night."

For some reason, this made Ruby snort and chuckle at me before suddenly blowing into full on laughter. I raised my eyebrow at the reaction, not understanding why it was so funny. After she finally calmed down, she looked at me with the occasional snicker and said, "I don't know why, but you wanting to be a werewolf feels like such an overplayed stereotype!"

I blinked, still not sure what exactly was so funny in the first place. Was it funny because I was a wolf Faunus? I guess I could sort of see the irony in that, although probably not enough to appreciate it like Ruby had.

Should I be offended by this? I feel like I was supposed to be offended.

Rolling my eyes, I decided to shrug off her humor and switched the topic to focus on her instead. "What about you then? What semblance would you choose to pick if you had the option?"

Wiping away a tear, she tilted her head in thought. After a few considerable moments passed, she asked, "You mean, like, besides the one that I already have?"

"Yeah. If you had the option to pick a semblance that's different than the one you already have, what kind of semblance would you want?"

"That's a good question… I never really thought about it to be honest." She furrowed her eyebrows, "Huh… I've had my speed semblance for so long, it's hard to imagine a life without it since I use it more often than not. But if I had to choose, I'd say…"

She paused in consideration, and I began to lightly beat on the table to do a dramatic drum roll.

"Maybe time powers? Time powers are pretty cool." She finally decided.

"Uh, there are a lot of different time powers out there Ruby. Any specific time power you're thinking about?"

"Mm… All of them."

"All of them?" I chuckled.

"Yep. All of them. Rewind and fast-forward time, pause time, slow motion time. Time traveling seems like a fascinating power to have." She listed off. "Plus, if I had time powers, I could just pretend to still have my original speed semblance when I slow down time because it'll barely be different for anyone else."

"Well, that's pretty creative-"

"OOH, NO WAIT!" She interrupted, excitingly waving her arm in front of my face, "I just thought of a better idea! If I could replace my semblance with something else, I would totally replace it with the power to turn anything I see into a plate of cookies!"

"..." I was both stunned and speechless.

"Oh, what would I call it...? Ummm- Cookie Vision! Yeah, I would want Cookie Vision! If I ever get hungry, I would just look at a rock or a chair or something, and then POOF! Cookies for everyone! Aw man, that would be such an amazing power! Turn anything and everything into cookies!" She raved on and on.

I contently decided to stay quiet and listen to her spiel, not because it was interesting, but rather because it was hilarious to see her passionately go on about why cookies have the potential power to end world hunger and all the conflicts in the world if only everyone would just have easier access to them.

 _Quirky girl._ I grinned to myself.

* * *

 _Three days later…_

Apparently, there was an important meeting being planned by White Fang. A fox Faunus on a bike threw a box my way after I was walking home from my shift.

Picking up the box, I opened it to find that it contained a new Scroll and a letter informing all members and recruits to come to an abandoned building with disclosed directions leading to it.

And it was all going to take place on… Sunday.

I cursed under my breath at the crappy timing. I wanted to go see Ruby again later this weekend, but now I had to deal with something like this instead? What could be so important that they couldn't just send an email or text message about it?

Despite the poor scheduling, I sighed and accepted the fact that if I was going to join a movement as important as the White Fang, I'd need to make a few sacrifices here and there in order to help the cause.

"Duty calls, I guess." I muttered depressingly.

At least they were kind enough to provide me a new Scroll, even if it was sort of a knockoff. Real Scrolls were usually expensive as all balls, but the White Fang apparently knew a guy who could mass produce counterfeits that were actually functional. I had been saving up to buy one after I lost my last one, but I guess I could use that money for other things now.

Still, Ruby was going to wonder why I didn't show up at the Mint Factory this Sunday...

I'll try and make it up to her later.

Remembering our most recent conversation, I decided to take a detour and go to a nearby pastry shop. Her favorites were chocolate chip, right?

* * *

 _Four days later…_

 ***Jingle-Jangle***

"I'm baaack!" Ruby cheerfully announced.

Walking up to the counter, she greeted the owner with a wave as she hid a box behind her back, "Hi Mr. Cambridge! I have a surprise for our friendly neighborhood Scooper Boy!"

"Ruby. Hello there." Mint greeted back, albeit not as cheerfully. He couldn't seem to muster up the will to match her excitement at the moment. "Sorry to say, but he's not here today. He texted me a while ago and said that he had somewhere important to go…"

"Oh…" Most of Ruby's chipper enthusiasm visibly diminished. Pulling out her box, she mumbled glumly, "I even bought him a present too. Thought it might make him laugh, or something."

"Now now, don't you worry none. I'm sure he'll be back working here tomorrow and you can see him again next week." He consoled, "If you want, you can leave the box with me. I'll be sure to hand it to him when he comes in, and let him know it's from you!"

She slowly nodded, regaining some of her pep, "Alright, Mr. Cambridge." After handing him the box, she asked, "Did he tell you where he went for today?"

"Nope. All he texted was that it was something important."

 _Something important…?_

She felt a nagging feeling in the back of her head that something was wrong…

Could it somehow be related to the White-

...

She should ask about it later the next time she saw him.

* * *

 _The next day…_

 ***Jingle-Jangle***

"Clocking in, boss!" I called out as I entered the parlor.

"There you are! Was wondering where you've been." I heard the boss's voice in the back. "Think you can get over here and help an old man out? Carrying something heavy isn't as easy as it used to be when you're my age."

"Sure thing, boss."

I walked into the back and saw the old coot arching his back up and stretching in front of new sofa chair.

"I need to move this thing to the corner, but I can't seem to push it by-" he turned around to face me, only to gasp in horror, "Oh dear lord, have mercy!"

Damn, I was hoping he was senile enough to not notice the black eye. Guess it was too noticeable for even him to look past.

He rushed over to me and started placing his hands on my face to inspect the wound. "What the hell happened to you?! How did you get this black eye?!"

"What, you mean this thing?" I tried to play it off casually, coming up with a semi-believable lie on the spot, "Stupid thing really. I walked into a pole. Wasn't paying attention to where I was going."

He stared at me doubtfully, before slowly repeating, "You… walked into a pole? You got a black eye from walking into a pole?"

I shrugged, "I was walking really fast."

As much as I wished he'd buy it and leave it at that, anyone could tell just by looking at my face that no pole in the world would be able to leave a hardcore mark like mine. Unless, like, the pole was made of magnets or something, and my face was a refrigerator door. Something like that was pretty unlikely though, so no one would bother to even think about it.

Placing both of his hands on my shoulders, he calmly spoke, "Look kid, I know what you do during your off hours is usually none of my business. But you gotta understand, I do care about you like a father would care for his son. I don't know if you got into a fight, or if you're hanging with the wrong crowd, but I'd much rather you tell me that it's none of my business rather than lie straight to my face."

"Boss, I appreciate the sentiment. Really, I do!" I gently pulled both his hands off of me, "But you're kind of making a big fuss over nothing here. It's just a black eye from a pole. It'll heal in no time!"

"It's not _how_ you got the black eye that worries me. The _why_ part is the bigger question here." He looked disappointed, "What would Ruby say if she saw this? Didn't you consider how she might feel from seeing you injured like this?"

"Well, I mean, she'd probably chuckle a bit if I told her about the pole?" I offered.

"You're not taking this seriously." He deadpanned.

"I am clearly not, no." I replied in an equally deadpanned expression.

He sighed, "Alright, I see how it is. I'll let this slide for now, since you're clearly trying to hide something from me. But don't think you can fool Ruby with that dumb pole story when she gets in here on Sunday."

"Speaking of!" I exclaimed loudly, desperate to move on to another topic. "How is she? Did Ruby say anything yesterday?"

"If you must know, your girlfriend wanted to surprise you with a gift yesterday, only to be heartbroken when she realized you weren't there for her." He harrumphed with his arms crossed.

My non-injured eye twitched at his choice of words, "I'm not sure she would appreciate you referring to her as my girlfriend like that."

"And of course, out of everything I've said, you'd focus on that." He playfully shrugged.

"Well, what else was I supposed to focus on?! Just because she's a girl and I'm a guy, doesn't mean we have that kind of relationship!"

"Could have fooled me." He waved me over to the corner, "Anyway, she left it with me in case you came back. The gift is in the closet over here."

I actually raised an eyebrow at the mention of a gift as I followed him, wondering what Ruby could have gotten me.

Opening the closet door, I crouched down to get a look at the white, unassuming box. Feeling up the box, I asked, "What's inside?"

"You'd rather ask me than open it for yourself?"

Good point…

I grabbed the box and stood back up to open it, curious to see what was inside.

…

Snrk. Hmhm. Hmhmhmhmheheheh!

A wolf mask. She got me a werewolf mask.

"Oh my god, Ruby, what have you done." I laughed, excitedly donning the hideous thing just to see how it looked on me.

I faced at the mirror, admiring my new and amazing transformation.

"What in the hell is that?" I heard the boss ask me in an incredulous tone.

Turning around, I did my best threatening pose and spoke in a creepy raspy voice, " _I am no longer the boy you once knew, Mint. I am now… Wolf-man! Creature of the night!"_ I raised my hands up in a claw formation for dramatic flair.

He shook his head at me in disbelief, "I'll never understand you kids."

I turned around again to face the mirror, and adjusted my mask as I continued to do a bunch of wacky and silly poses. Behind the mask, I was grinning from ear to ear. This was definitely the most thoughtful gift I'd ever gotten from anyone ever. Who cared if it looked stupid? I loved it.

"Well, I'm glad that you're at least enjoying yourself. I hope you plan to show how much you appreciate this gift to Ruby soon."

I chuckled, "I think I got something in mind."

"Good." He nodded, before pointing back at the sofa chair, "Now would you mind helping me move this damn thing?"

"Alright, sure." I finished up my brief modeling career and went over to help carry one side of the chair.

On the other side, the boss bent down as he smirked, "You don't plan to take that off anytime soon, do ya?"

"Hell no."

* * *

 _The Sixth Week_

 ***Jingle-Jangle***

"Hey Mr. Cambridge, I'm here to see our friendly neighborhood Scooper Boy and get my weekly fix of minty chocolate!" Ruby cheered as she skipped daintily up to the counter.

She was confused for a bit when she heard a raspy growling voice from behind the counter, " _This Scooper Boy you speak of, he is no longer the same as he once was. You are too late, Miss Rose…"_

"Uh… Wat."

" _For you see, he has now become the terrifying Wolf-man! Plague of the night!"_ I howled before jumping up in front of her and waving my arms around like a madman. I even added in an extra "ABOOGAWOOGAWOOGA" sound effect for emphasis.

It took her a moment to realize it was me, before smiling and joining in on the joke. With theatrical flair, she proclaimed, "Oh no! My friend has transformed into a beast! What horrors await me now?!"

" _My first act of evil will be to steal ALL the minty chocolate, and leave none for you!"_

"The horror! The hoooorrooor!" She covered her eyes dramatically and shook an angry fist at me.

Before I could keep playful act on, I recoiled back in shock when I felt the back of my head getting sprayed.

Turning around, I saw the boss giving me a threatening look as he aimed a menacing spray bottle at me. "Go on then! Shoo! Shoo Wolf-man! You're scaring away my customers!" He shouted, spraying water at my face.

I did my best impression of a dog's whimper (which I thought I nailed down flat) and scurried away in defeat.

Ruby covered her mouth and giggled as she followed after me to our usual table.

* * *

"You know, I bought that mask mostly as a joke. I didn't realize you would like it so much." Ruby leaned on her palm and continuously poked my wolf-mask nose.

"As far as I'm concerned, this IS my semblance." I proudly waggled my wolf ears.

"Pfft. I'm pretty sure that's not how semblances work." She chuckled, still poking my face. "Have you been wearing this for the entire week?"

"Well, I mean, no." I paused, then said, "I take it off when I go to sleep."

"That doesn't sound very werewolf-like to me."

"You're right." I nodded at her astute observation, "I should become fully dedicated and wear it while I sleep too. Good idea."

"I wasn't trying to give you that idea, ya dummy." She stuck her tongue out at me in a cheeky manner. "Here, let me try it on!"

Before I could react, she reached out and pulled off my mask, revealing the black mark on my face that I really hoped she wouldn't see today.

I flinched when I heard her gasp. _Dammit._

"Your eye! What happened to your eye?!" She discarded the mask, already forgetting about it in favor of reaching out and hovering her hands near my wound. "Who did this to you?!"

I tried my best to calm her down, covering a hand on my black eye before she could look too closely at it. "This little thing? I mean, it's nothing really! I'm fine! I just got this from a-"

It was then I realized that I hadn't been able to come up with a better lie than the pole story I told Cambridge, even though I had about a week in advance to think of one just in case Ruby found out about it. It was also at this point that I realized that I was probably more stupid than I originally thought.

Okay, no worries. Couldn't be too hard to improvise a better lie on the spot, right?

"-uuh, got this from… walking… into a… bar?" I said unsurely sure of myself.

Sigh… I sucked at lying.

Ruby furrowed her eyebrows, "You know you're a terrible liar, right?"

Bleugh.

She forcefully pulled my hand away from my eye, and leaned in closer to study the mark. "This was made by a fist. The shape is too round to be considered anything close to a bar."

"Well, I mean, um…" I weakly shrugged, "I was walking really fast?"

BLEUGH.

"Unless your entire face was literally magnetized into hitting a bar, I don't see that ever happening." She flatly pointed out.

 **BLEUGH.**

"Uh…" I mumbled, having no idea how to argue with her eerily familiar sense of logic.

Taking a deep breath, she loosened her expression and frowned sadly at me. "Please, I want you to tell me the truth. Friends don't keep secrets from each other, right?"

"Ruby, I'm not trying to keep secrets from you. It's just…" I scratched the back of my head, blank of any excuses I could come up with.

"Does this have anything to do with where you were last Sunday?" She asked.

"I, uh, it's not, I mean-"

"Was it something related to the White Fang?"

I shut my mouth.

Was it really that obvious?

Thinking about it now, I guess it kinda was. She already knew that I was part of the White Fang. It'd only be natural that it would be the first thing that popped in her mind when she found something suspicious about me. Plus, it wasn't like I was any good at hiding it from her.

" _Please_ , tell me what's wrong."

I looked up at her and saw her pleading eyes staring into me. Big round eyes that almost seemed like they were nearing to tears. The look reminded me of a puppy dog trying to beg for attention.

It was sort of cute. In that sort of heart-wrenching way that only cute sad things could do to you.

Not strong enough to withstand such a face, I was forced to look away out of guilt. Then I sighed, realizing that I was dragging this out longer than it needed to be.

Maybe there was no harm in telling her what happened. Besides, she already knew I was White Fang and that hasn't been a problem so far.

"Alright." I finally relented, before admitting, "I got this injury from a fight. It was with another White Fang member…"

"How did it happen?" She shifted herself in her seat, and patiently waited for me start.

I collected my thoughts for a bit, then began to explain, "So, last Sunday I had to leave for a mission with the White Fang. We were…" I paused, looking at her nervously. If nothing else, I was still a little bit worried at how she would feel about what I was… doing.

"It's alright." She reassured me, "Just tell me everything. I promise I won't say anything until you're done."

At least that made me comfortable enough to continue. "We were going on a raid. Robbing and trashing an anti-Faunus restaurant. The owners were a family that refused to give service to anyone who was even remotely related to a Faunus. Meaning, human or not, if they suspected you were friends with a Faunus or even just sympathized with them, then you were kicked out without another word. That kind of behavior would spread an unhealthy mentality that would make life for Faunus even harder. So the White Fang decided to do something about them."

"Uh," Ruby held a finger up with a hesitant look, "I know I promised not to say anything until you're done, but… you didn't…-"

"I wasn't going to hurt them. I just wanted to scare them so that they'd stop treating the Faunus so poorly. At the very least, treating someone as an equal out of fear is a lot better than doing nothing at all."

"Oh. Okay…" She sighed in relief, but then asked, "So, how did you get that black eye then? You said you got in a fight with another White Fang member?"

"Apparently, someone in our raiding group didn't see it my way," I grumbled. "Even though I didn't want to hurt anyone, my 'partner' had other ideas. Instead of trashing the shop and damaging the property, he went straight to the owners and assaulted them! I tried to stop him! I reminded him that we were only supposed to scare them, not beat them up. If we ever stooped down to their level, then we'd be no better than all the humans that would mistreat us! But the guy was having none of it and just kept kicking the owners while they were down, saying that all humans were the same and that dominating them was the only way to win or something equally as moronic."

"What did you do?"

"Well, I had to do something to stop him if he wasn't going to listen to me." I sat back and looked away from her, "So… I punched him in the face."

Ruby stayed silent as she listened.

"I'll admit, I probably didn't think that through. We ended up getting into a fight in the shop and it turned out that he was much stronger than I was. When I punched him, it only stunned him for a bit. When he punched me straight in the face, it actually broke my mask in half and gave me a black eye. Go figure."

"Did you get hurt anywhere else from the fight?"

"No, thankfully. A few of the other White Fang members held both of us back to stop us from going ham on each other. Other than a few bruises and throwing some insults at the other, neither of us did anything too serious. Our leader ended up calling off the raid due to the fighting and we all ran away from the shop before the authorities could catch up."

"So that's all that happened? Nothing else?"

"Yeah… I mean, our raid mission was a bust, and now someone in the White Fang thinks I'm a traitor for standing up to defend some racist humans. That's pretty much all that happened." I finished.

After few moments of brief silence, I heard Ruby sigh frustratedly, "Jeeze."

I sighed as well, knowing she had to be feeling pretty angry at me for keeping this from her. "Hey, I'm sorry for not telling this to you sooner. I just didn't want you to worry over my problems. There's not really much you could have done, so I didn't want to get you involved…"

"Ugh, I'm not even mad about that." She huffed, crossing her arms at me with a disappointed look, "You shouldn't have taken part in that raid in the first place. It doesn't matter whether or not the owners deserved it, it was still wrong for you to try to damage their property. You said it yourself, didn't you? Stooping down to their level would make you no better than them?"

I could try to justify that what I was doing was different, but I didn't think I could come up with a good argument. So I just grumbled and faced away from her.

I felt her pull my head back towards her, allowing her to examine the black eye again. This time in a softer voice, she told me, "Still though… I'm glad that you fought back when you thought you saw someone doing wrong. Even when you knew the owners of that restaurant were bigots who hated Faunus, you still went against someone in your own group in order to prevent them from getting hurt. You fought for your ideals and you did what you believed was right. That much at least makes me happy."

I blinked in surprised and felt myself blushing from flattery. "Uh… thanks."

"I'm… I'm not gonna say I agree with you joining the White Fang. But I won't force my ideals down your throat either. As long as you're a good person who does his best to help others, even in his own certain way, I'll never think any less of you. I'd still consider you as my friend."

Hearing that from her, I couldn't help but smile at her kindness. She truly was one of a rare few. It was almost hard to believe that she even existed, right then and there. To have met and befriended a human that was so carefree and playful, so unabashedly polite and kind hearted, so fun to hang out with…

Someone that actually treated me like an equal.

It was surreal. It was weird. Yet it was comforting to know people like her existed. She reminded me of what I was fighting for.

"That… that means a lot to me, Ruby. A lot more than you might realize…" I quietly mumbled out, scratching my neck awkwardly.

"What was that?" Ruby asked as she leaned closer to hear me better.

"I said thanks, Ruby." I rephrased. Remembering something, I sat up and walked to the back of the shop, "Wait here for a bit. I bought you something to make up for not being here last Sunday."

"Hm?"

I came back and set down a jar of Pumpkin Pete's Chocolate Chip Cookies on the table, "Your favorite was chocolate chip, right?"

I raised an eyebrow when she suddenly gasped and squealed excitedly. Quickly fanning herself with one hand and covering her mouth with the other, she asked, "You got me cookies?!"

The way she was acting, you'd think I just told her she won the lottery. She must have really liked cookies.

"This is literally the best gift you could have ever given me, I love you so much right now!" She gushed, drooling over the jar with something akin to primal hunger in her eyes.

Sort of getting creeped out now. "Uh, it's just a jar of cookies. I mean, not even expensive ones. You could have probably gotten them as easily as I did."

"Well, yeah. But it's the thought behind it that counts." She briefly got her sanity back to explain, before going back to ogling the jar with predatory intentions again.

…

After about five minutes of staring at her doing nothing but stare at a jar of cookies, I coughed awkwardly and asked, "Sooo… You gonna eat that or-"

A gust of rose petals covered my face, blocking my view of the jar for a split second before my vision returned to see the jar opened and it's content void of anything at all.

"Oh, you already emptied it… somehow." I said, dumbfounded,

Licking her fingers clean, she giggled, "I guess we're both even now. I got you a gift, and you got me one. This all worked out in the end, didn't it?"

"Ruby, you are one weird lady. You know that, right?"

Picking up my wolf-mask that was dropped on the floor earlier, she playfully replied, "I sure am, _Wolf-man, Plague of The Night_."

I raised a finger at that to argue, but thought better of it and went to grab the mask instead. "Touché." I said simply, donning the mask again.

* * *

 _The Seventh Week_

 ***Jingle-Jangle***

"Hey boss, I'm here to spend my day off!" I called out as I walked into the parlor shop.

"Oh hey! You're here!"

To my surprise, I found Ruby waving at me as she sat in our usual booth. It wasn't the fact that she was here, it was more the fact that I was usually the one to show up before her. I hadn't expect that trend to break anytime soon.

I walked over to her and sat down in my seat, "Well, you're early."

"I got excited to hang out again, so I left first thing in the morning to get here." She smiled, taking a sip of her milkshake.

"Didn't realize I was someone that was worth leaving first thing in the morning for." I chuckled.

"Oh shush, you." She playfully stuck her tongue out at me before pulling out something from a bag I didn't notice behind her seat. "Brought something with me today. You play video games much?"

"I have my fair share of games. Sort of a casual, though." I answered.

She laid a holo-projector on the table and handed me a controller, "Good. Today, we're gonna waste away our souls playing nothing but video games."

I raised an eyebrow at the controller as she started up the projector. A screen flashed up with the words _Total Annihilation_ showcased on the top, with two ninja characters fighting in the background.

"Uh… okay then?" I mumbled.

* * *

She was fast. Steady. Meticulous. Her hand to eye coordination was as seamless as her quick reflexes, and she could somehow predict my every move five seconds ahead of it. She had played this game for years, I could definitely tell. Took the time to master every move and every combo of her favorite character until she could practically pull it off in her sleep.

A complete newborn like me would have no chance in hell against her.

"Augh, come on! That's not fair!" Ruby growled.

I grinned as I kept my guy crouched in the corner of the screen while throwing nonstop shurikens at Ruby's fighter. Her character was helpless against my relentless storm of infinite shurikens to the face.

Whoever made up the projectile move in this game was probably an idiot. This thing was so overpowered. If Ruby couldn't block, she would get hit and knocked down to the ground, only for her to get hit again the moment she recovered. If she did block, she couldn't do anything other than stay in the opposite corner for eternity as I sapped away her health bar, one tick at a time. The shuriken was too quick to dodge and was so easily spammable, it might as well have been a machine gun that never ran out of ammo. This move could be considered an actual cancer to the near perfect combat design in this game.

And I absolutely loved the hell out of it.

" _ **HUMILIATE HER!"**_ The game demanded the moment I got Ruby's health bar empty.

Since I didn't really memorize any combo finishers that my character could do, I just sort of kept sitting in the corner and threw another shuriken at her face before her character exploded for no discernible reason.

" _ **Player 2 wins."**_

Ruby unceremoniously dropped her controller and slammed her face into the table.

Poking fun, I began teasing her, "So hey, seems like I'm pretty good at this game."

"You're a liar and a cheater and your entire existence is dead to me now." She muffled with her face still planted.

"There there, Ruby." I chuckled, consolingly petting her head. "I'm sure you'll be as good as me if you keep practicing for the next fifty years or so."

She whined under my touch, but didn't do anything to stop me.

A second or two later, I decided to stand up and walk into the back of the shop, "I'm getting the feeling you won't be up for another match. But since the plan for today is to waste it away entirely on video games, wait here while I get my own equipment."

In the break room, I rummaged around in the closet before pulling out a holo-projector connected to a keyboard and mouse.

Walking back to our table, Ruby raised her head and looked curiously at my game console. "Keyboard controls?"

"Yeah. Not much of a couch gamer." I laid my equipment down and started setting it all up. "You ever played MOBAs before?"

"Moe-bahs? The heck is a moe-bah?"

I gave her a grin that seemed sadistic enough for her to slightly shiver in trepidation.

Time to bring this onto my turf now-

* * *

"Huh. This is pretty easy, actually." Ruby commented nonchalantly.

" _ **Atlas's Dust Mines destroyed. Mantle Kingdom wins!"**_

I face planted onto the table and tried to muffle my screams of agony.

It took me years and years in order to master this game and others in the same genre. I literally spent months of restless nights, practicing and honing my skills just to be able to become something considered even remotely professional at this game.

AND HERE COMES LITTLE MISS PERFECT WALTZING IN AND KICKING MY ASS AND DIGNITY INTO SUBMISSION WITH HER GODDAMN NATURAL-BORN PRODIGAL LEADERSHIP SKILLS. FUCK ALL TALENTED PEOPLE, I HATE THEM ALL FOR MAKING ME FEEL INFERIOR IN LIFE.

"I don't really see what's so bad about this game. The way you described it, it sounded like one of the most complicated games to ever exist on Remnant. But it kinda felt more like a simple strategy game to me."

I screamed into the table again.

Patting my head, she whispered in faux-comfort, "There there. You'll start getting better after practicing for the next eighty years or so."

I snarled threateningly, but didn't stop her from petting me.

"You sure are living up to the wolf-stereotype, aren'tcha?" She chuckled, before whipping out a bag from under the table. "I brought more than one game with me. Want to play something else instead?"

"You have anything non-competitive and more cooperative? I don't think my ego can handle another beating…" I mumbled, not once lifting my face off the table out of broken pride.

She hummed as she rummaged around in her bag, before pulling out a cartridge. "You wanna play a zombie game?"

I screamed into the table again.

"What? What's wrong?"

* * *

 _The Eighth Week_

"So… Who's Casey Williams again?" I asked as Ruby excitedly slapped her headphones on me.

"She's one of the most super amazingiest singers in the whole entire world! Trust me, just listen to her voice and I promise it'll be like love at first sight!"

"Experiencing love at first sight by listening to her voice. Seems legit." I hummed.

"Shushshshh" she got uncomfortably close to my face as she pressed her finger to my lips, "Just listen and be entranced."

I felt myself heat up from her close proximity, and forced myself to lean away from her, "Alright alright, I'm listening."

Geez, I was starting to realize how cute she was.

She gave me a small grin and patiently awaited my reaction.

Waiting a second or so, I heard the pianos start to play and a girl giving a soft melody to complement it. After that intro though, it completely changed its tone with something more suspenseful. Guitars start to join in, the drum beat picking up.

" _Intruder, identify yourself."_ A robotic voice spoke.

The guitars played a rhythm to hype up the song to it's rising point, before the male lead began to sing.

" _Born with  
_ _no life,  
_ _Into subjugation.  
_ _Treated  
_ _like a  
_ _worthless animal,"_

When the female lead started to sing, I actually widened my eyes in surprise as I listened to the lyrics.

" _Stripped of  
_ _all rights,  
_ _Just a lesser being,  
_ _Crushed by cruel,  
_ _ruthless Human rule._

" _When it started,  
_ _All we wanted was a chance to live our lives,  
_ _Now in darkness,  
_ _Taking everything we want and we will rise-  
_ _We'll rise-  
_ _We'll rise!"_

" _From shadows,  
_ _We'll descend upon the world,  
_ _Take back what you stole.  
_ _From shadows,  
_ _We'll reclaim our destiny,  
_ _Set our future free,  
_ _And we'll rise.  
_ _And we'll rise."_

" _Above the darkness and the shame.  
_ _Above the torture and the pain.  
_ _Above the ridicule and hate.  
_ _Above the binding of our fate-"_

I took the headphones off in a dumbfounded stupor, unsure if I could handle listening to any more of the song.

It hit home. It hit home really deep.

"Did you not like it?"

I snapped out of it and turned over to Ruby, seeing her looking at me with a disappointed frown.

"No, it's not that. I was…" I paused, before asking her, "This Casey Lee Williams girl…Is she a Faunus?"

"Actually, she's human. Did the song give you the impression that she was a Faunus?"

"Yeah… I mean, the lyrics kind of made me think so at least."

A human wrote this song? Seriously?

"You see, this song was actually made for the trailer of a TV show a year ago. The song was written about a group of misguided characters that lived in the middle of the Faunus Rights Revolution. The series was half-fictional and half-historical, and I liked to think it taught a nice moral aesop somewhere in there that probably went over my head."

"Huh. Well that explains the lyrics…" I murmured, then asked, "How good was the show?"

"In my opinion? Kind of lacking in the writing department. The trailers hyped the story up to be more suspenseful and exciting, but it ended up being more silly and mellow instead, and only occasionally dove into serious parts. It only just started to change the tone of the series and began to delve deeper into the conflict at the end of Season 3 and start of Season 4, so I'm hoping it's leading to something good." She critiqued, before raising a finger, "But I gotta say, it has some of the most amazing fighting choreography I've seen. Not to mention the fact that every single song in its soundtrack is complete awesome-sauce, especially the ones with Casey singing. I'd recommend watching it with your brain turned off and a bowl of popcorn in your hands."

"Might give it a shot then." I chuckled.

"So does that mean you actually liked the song?!" She suddenly squealed excitedly.

With an expectant look like that, how could I break her heart and say no?

"Yeah, I really like it. In fact, you might have picked the perfect song to get me intrigued about her other work."

"AAA- I knew you'd like her! She's basically the perfect goddess of everything ever!" Ruby gushed and bounced in circles around me.

I couldn't help but smile as I watched her. Something about her just made everything she did so adorable and infectious. Sort of like a puppy happily chasing its tail around.

While she was still hopping around, I decided to pull out my Scroll and tried to search for more about Casey Lee Williams.

Ruby stopped just behind me and looked over my shoulders as she watched me type. I imagined that her eyes were glowing and her smile was bigger than her face as she looked on.

"That reminds me actually," she brought up, "What sort of music do you usually listen to?"

Uh…

"Well- I mean… that- that is sort of a hard question to answer, because… Um…" I mumbled while scratching my neck.

Hoo boy, how do I explain that my music playlist is actually just a collection of random memes from the past decade without seeming like a complete idiot?

Trick question, I was already an idiot for making my music playlist a collection of random memes from the past decade.

"Becaaaauuuussssseeee...?" She waved her hand around for me to continue.

Okay quick think of an excuse to not let her know you have no taste-

"It's mostly just classical boring adult music. The oldies, you know? You might not like it."

I am a genius.

"PFFT, baloney." She scoffed, before suddenly grabbing my Scroll away from me and sat back on her seat, "I love the classics! They're like the pioneers for all future music!"

I am going to die.

"Wait, Ruby, it's not going to be what you thi-" I tried to stop her from going into my playlist before it was too late.

But it was already too late.

" _And so I cry sometimes when I'm lying in bed,  
_ _Just to get it all out, what's in my head  
_ _AND I-I-I-I  
_ _I'm feeling (feeling) a little peculiar._

 _And so I wake in the morning and I step outside,  
_ _And I take a deep breath and get real high  
_ _And I scream at the top of my lungs  
_ _What's going on?!_

 _(And I say)  
_ _HEEEYAAAYAEEAYYEAAAEYAAAEY"_

Ruby stared blankly at the screen as the music played on, while I was already facepalming in shame.

I heard her tap the screen, and on went the next song.

" _Life is like a hurricane,  
_ _Here in Duckburg,  
_ _Race cars, lasers, airplanes,  
_ _It's a duck-blur_

 _We might solve a mystery,  
_ _Or rewrite history!_

 _Ducktales! Woo hoo!"_

She tapped the screen again.

" _Look, if you had  
_ _mom's spaghetti,  
_ _Would you capture it,  
_ _or just let it slip? Yo_

 _His palms spaghetti,  
_ _knees weak, arms spaghetti  
_ _There's vomit on his sweater spaghetti,  
_ _mom's spaghetti"_

Tap.

" _SomeBODY once told me the world is gonna roll me,  
_ _I ain't the sharpest tool in the shed,  
_ _She was looking kind of dumb with her finger and her thumb,  
_ _In the shape of an "L" on her forehead,_

 _Well the years start coming and they don't stop coming,  
_ _and they don't stop coming  
_ _and they don't stop coming  
_ _and they don't stop coming"_

Tap.

She set my Scroll on the table, and pushed it towards me. "You uh…" Ruby started off awkwardly enough, "You have quite an unexpected taste for… uh… music."

"Yeah." I deadpanned.

Ruby stared at me.

I stared back at her.

Awkward silence ensued.

…

"So… uh…" Ruby broke the silence with a cough, and asked, "What- um… What kind of genre is that?"

"Shitposting."

"I… uh…" She wanted to reply, but ended up having no idea how to respond to that. So instead, she kept quiet.

"Let's just talk about something else and forget this happened."

"A-Alright then…"

Sigh… hope this awkward pain train disappears by the time we see each other next week.

* * *

 _That night…_

Ruby Rose restlessly turned and fumbled around in her bed, brows furrowed deep in thought.

Something went wrong today when she went to visit her Wolf-Faunus friend. Something that alienated him away from her and caused the whole day to be an awkward mess.

The whole time she tried to speak to him after she listened to his playlist, it was like he was too embarrassed to look her in the eyes. He kept responding with short sentences and simple words that kept cutting their discussions short. She also realized that she probably didn't help since she was no less guilty of doing the same thing.

Ugh, it was like they were strangers again, talking to each other for the very first time. She hated it.

And all because she took his Scroll and listened to his songs! What was wrong with his songs?! Sure, they were weird and all, but did he have to act like she just discovered his deepest darkest secrets?!

Ugggggh, this was killing her-

…

Maybe she might be able to fix this.

The whole reason for this whole awkward debacle was because she didn't get his taste in music, right? So maybe if she did some research and learnt all about the songs he liked, that might make things better again for them.

"What was it called again?" She asked herself, before sneaking under her blanket and opening her Scroll.

Resolute in her decision, she thought it would be worth it to lose a couple hours of sleep if it meant patching the holes in her relationship with the Faunus-boy.

Thus, she began browsing.

…

…

…

"Huh, so this is what shitposting means. The name made me imagine something else entirely."

* * *

 _Three Days Later._

"Heeeey, how's it going?" Ruby flailed her arm around haphazardly as she greeted me.

"Hey Rubes." I blinked in surprise, "Wasn't expecting to see you on a Tuesday. I thought you had classes?"

"I mmmmmmmmmm called in sick. And then I snuck out because I wanted to see yooouuu agin." She said, struggling to balance herself on her seat.

Worried, I went over to her and helped straighten her back up, "Jeez, you doing alright?" I did a quick glance over to her.

She had bags under her eyes and her usuallyssmooth hair was disheveled. Her movements seemed tipsy and she spoke with a slight slur in her tone. It was obvious that she hasn't gotten any rest in a while.

"Ruby, you look like you haven't slept in forever! What's wrong?"

"Mm-not forever." She corrected me, before gripping a hand on the table to stabilize herself. "Just the last three days, I think."

"Three days? You haven't slept in three days?!"

"Did I say three days?" She asked herself, her eyes narrowing in concentration as she tried to grasp onto reality. "Because I meant… like… less than that. Or something. Yeah, probably not three days."

"Three days or not, you still look like you're in desperate need of rest. What the hell were you doing to keep you up for so long that it made you into a restless zombie?"

"The meaning of life." She answered vaguely, before changing the topic altogether like a mood whiplash, "Speaking of, I got this thing that I want to do to you- I mean show you."

"Um, what?" I raised an eyebrow, feeling a bit lost in this conversation.

She rummaged around her pockets for a bit, before grabbing her Scroll and setting it in my hands. "You should… listen… listen to that. It's a song by… Casey, I think. Yeah, definitely."

"Ruby, maybe I should call someone to pick you up. You seriously look like you're about to pass out at any moment."

Ruby started leaning against me and slapped her hands around my arms. "No no- I promise you'll like it." She mumbled, "It's another of Casey's songs. Yeah, you'll totally like it."

I opened up her contact list and looked around, unsure which to call first. I could call her dad or her uncle, but didn't she tell me they lived on Patch Island? Maybe I should call one of her friends, they might be more close by. "Ruby, who do I call that's nearby and can help bring you back home?"

"Listen to iiiittt." She murmured, reaching out to grab her Scroll, "C'moooon… It's goooooood."

"Seriously Ruby, this doesn't seem like the time-"

She interrupted me by making a whining noise into my chest. "Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmph"

I sighed, "Fine, if I listen to it, will you go back home and get some rest?"

She wordlessly nodded by rubbing her head up against me. "Mm-hmm."

 _My god, I swear she's like a human puppy or something_. "Alright, here. Play the song you want me to listen to." I told her as I handed back her Scroll.

Taking hold of her Scroll again, she fumbled around with it for a while since the sleep deprivation must have messed up her hand-eye coordination.

I was waiting patiently for her to either finish pulling up her song, or pass out. Whichever happened, I was going to have to call her friends to have them pick her up.

Cambridge walked by the counter and did a double-take when he saw Ruby leaning against my chest as we sat next to each other at our table.

As soon as we made eye contact, he flashed a smile and gave me a thumbs up before heading back inside.

I felt my eye twitch in irritation, knowing I was going to be in for major teasing later today.

"Okay, I got it." Ruby mumbled and held her Scroll up. "Ready to be amazed?"

"Sure, yeah."

She pressed play on her Scroll, and I felt myself blinking dumbfoundedly.

" _We're no strangers to looove,  
_ _You know the rules and so do I (do I) (do i)  
_ _A full commitment's what I'm thinking of  
_ _You wouldn't get this from any other guy_

 _I just wanna tell you how I'm feeling  
_ _Gotta make you understand_

 _NEVER GONNA GIVE YOU UP  
_ _NEVER GONNA LET YOU DOWN  
_ _NEVER GONNA RUN AROUND AND DESERT YOU"_

As I sat there with furrowed eyebrows, comprehending the song I was listening too, Ruby Rose took one of her drowsy fingers up and poked me in the cheek in smug triumph. "You just gotten Rickrolled, son." She raised her finger and poked me in the mouth this time.

I blinked again, unsure how to go on from here. It's been a long while since I've gotten rickrolled like this, mostly due to the fact that the joke kinda got old and lost popularity within the past decade.

I pulled her hand away from fingering my mouth and sighed, "You stayed up late for three days just to research about memes, didn't you?"

"Yep."

"And you did it because of what happened on Sunday, didn't you?"

"Yep."

I sighed again, before chuckling warmly, "You are absolutely crazy and adorable, you know that?"

"Yep."

"Come on, give me your Scroll." I grabbed the device out of her hands and began scrolling through her contact lists and decided to pick the one that said 'Big Sis', "You're gonna miss your classes."

"Worth it."

With that, she spontaneously passed out in my arms and began drooling on my shirt.

I began to carefully push her away and set her aside in her seat, partially out of disgust from all the drool, and mostly because I was starting to get flustered with her head laying against my chest.

As the Scroll began dialing the contact, I held it to my ear and patiently waited as it rang before I heard a click and a girl on the other end, _"Hello? Ruby? Where are you right now, where did you go?"_

"Hi, is this Ruby's sister Yang? Yeah I'm a friend of hers, and I need you to come here to pick your sister up. She kinda passed out from sleep deprivation." I explained.

I flinched away from the Scroll and held it away from me when she suddenly screamed with a loud, eardrum-damaging, _"WHAT?!"_

Shaking off the head trauma, I continued, "I'll text you the address. Be here soon, yeah? I have no idea how to take care of her and my shift's gonna start in a few minutes-"

* **OH GOD JINGLE-JANGLE** *

"WHERE IS SHE?!" A buxom blonde girl with long wavy hair slammed the door to the shop open with literal red fire in her eyes as she scanned the shop.

Welp, no need to text her that address then, since her sister was apparently an omniscient time traveller.

The girl's eyes immediately zoomed in on Ruby with her face drooling on the table, and she began sprinting at the unconscious girl as if it was a matter of life and death. Not wanting to get injured by the pain train, I jumped out of the way before she could run me over.

Yang examined the sleeping beauty thoroughly, checking to see if she was hurt or injured in any possible way, with Ruby sleeping through it all being none the wiser. The blonde girl sighed in relief and her irises changed color to a more natural, calming lilac blue. Somehow.

Must be a semblance thing.

She walked up to me with an apologetic expression, "I am so sorry for this. I don't know what possessed her to do something like this. I knew she was sneaking out and staying up late for something, but I didn't think it would come to this…"

"N-No harm done." I nervously chuckled, handing over her sister's Scroll. Feeling sort of intimidated by her entrance, not to mention the fact that she somehow knew exactly where Ruby was and arrived no sooner than five seconds after I called, I tried to relieve the tension by making a polite joke, "Try not to let Ruby turn this into a habit, alright? Because… um… sleep deprivation is bad for the heart. And stuff."

Dear God, please don't kill me.

Yang steadily narrowed her eyes and started to step closer to me, much to my discomfort. I stayed silent though, as she peered her head over and around as if she was studying me like a modern art exhibit. Then she leaned back with a nod, like she was impressed.

"So you're the ice cream boy my sister keeps talking about, huh?" She sniffed in an exaggeratedly pompous manner. "Not bad. I approve."

"Uh… Approve of what?" I blinked.

Without uttering another word, she went over to Ruby and slung her over her shoulder. She then winked at me, before leaving the shop with her unconscious sister in tow.

I could only stand there, slightly confused at what just happened.

Life sure has gotten more… interesting since I met Ruby.

Hm…

She stayed up for three nights just to research something I was secretly into. I dunno why, but… I actually felt a little happy inside, knowing that. It was still freaking dumb of her to do that, but I just couldn't help but feel kinda happy from it.

I would have never expected a human to go to great lengths for me like that.

I would have never expected _anyone_ to do that, now that I think about it.

* * *

 _Ninth week…_

 _Tenth week…_

 _Twelfth week…_

 _Fifteenth week…_

* * *

 _Twentieth Sunday._

Ruby took a spoonful of mint sundae and swallowed the last of her snack, before balancing the spoon on her pinky finger.

I watched her intently, patient for my signal.

Cautiously, she took another spoon in front of her and balanced it on top of her other spoon. Then, she nodded at me to proceed.

Taking my cue, I precariously set a small cherry on my custom Spoon Catapult. With careful aiming, I slammed the other end of the spoon and launched the cherry to the air, directly at Ruby's spoon tower.

With her quick reflexes, she shifted her hand downwards and pulled it back up, just in time to catch the cherry in mid-air with her spoon tower. She whimpered a bit as the tower started to lose balance from the sudden weight, but was able to stabilize it just in time.

And there we go. One spoon balancing on top of another, with a cherry to finish it off.

Now we just wait around to see how long she can keep that balance.

I leaned on my palm and watched her intently as she effortlessly kept the balance up. Ruby smiled to herself, proud to be one of the masters of "not being lame at balancing two spoons and a cherry on a finger." If there was a tournament for something like this, she would definitely get first place.

After about five minutes of watching her do her balancing trick, my mind began to wander. Little tidbits of random thoughts flew by, with no real connection to any of them. Random stuff just to pass the time.

My eyes subconsciously wandered over to Ruby's face.

I like her face. It's cute. A lot of things about her is cute. Her hair, her eyes, her nose. Smile was definitely cute. She's cute.

Known her for almost half a year now. Time sure flies. Still remembered the day we first met.

It was so weird to know that she was usually so socially awkward around others. She never acted socially awkward when we first met. Then again, there was no need to be socially awkward when chasing down someone you thought was a criminal.

She always seemed so confident in herself. I liked her confidence. It was one of her admirable traits.

Admirable and cute.

It'd be nice if I could sit closer to her and hold her face in my hand. I'd bet it would feel warm. Warm to touch-

I blinked, realizing she was staring at me. Then realized that I had been staring at her while I let my mind wander. I rubbed my face briefly to hide my blush, before looking away to check on my Scroll.

Timer said seven minutes had passed.

I gave her a thumbs up.

She smiled back at me, feeling victorious at breaking her old record.

Letting her spoon tower fall, she caught both of the spoons in each of her hands and ducked her head forward to let the cherry land on her nose. Then with a quick bounce, she dropped the cherry into her mouth.

I chuckled.

She giggled back.

No words were spoken. No words needed to be spoken. It was a comforting atmosphere that didn't need to be ruined. I was here, hanging out with her after a whole week of juggling between my job and my secret life. She was here, hangout out with me after a whole week of juggling her school work and her Huntress duties.

We were both here to be with each other. And it was nice. Everything just felt nice.

I don't know when I started to like her. She had begun popping up in my head more often, and it was hard to ignore her. When I started feeling my chest churn at just the thought of her, it kind of became obvious that I had a crush on her.

Maybe it was because Cambridge kept teasing me about being her boyfriend. Maybe it was because she started looking more cute all of a sudden.

Maybe I just liked her because I liked her. Who knows?

Sitting here, across from her, doing nothing but just hanging out… it made me wonder…

I looked up to take a glance at her again, only to find her staring at me. I stared at her back.

She smiled.

I smiled.

This was nice.

I wished we could do this kind of thing forever. Just be in each other's presence.

If I told her how I felt about her, right now at this second, how would she react? Flustered? Panicked?

Would she like me back?

Does she already like me?

Would she start to like me if I asked her?

There was a rumbling noise.

We both shifted our attention to the cause of the noise. Her Scroll, vibrating on the table.

She gave an exasperated sigh, "It's my alarm. I gotta leave early for tomorrow morning's exams."

"Oh…" I mumbled disappointedly.

Pocketing the moment killer, she gave me a sad smile, "See you next week?"

I gave her a reassuring smile back, "Yeah. You know where to find me."

She nodded, before getting up from her seat and slowly walking towards the door. She was almost hesitant in her steps.

I didn't want her to leave either, to be honest. It was starting to get really boring without her around.

I wouldn't be able to see her again until the next week either… each week felt like it was beginning to stretch out longer than the last.

Ugh… This might be my last chance for today… Should I?

 _Screw it. I'm going for it._

Right when she set her hand on the door handle, I stopped her, "Hey Ruby?"

She stopped and immediately turned around, "Yeah?'

"Do you…" I stuttered a bit, before pushing on. "Do you maybe want to hang out next week? You know, the two of us. Together."

She raised an eyebrow at the question. "Uh… yeah. Sure? I mean, was that not going to be the plan?"

It took me a moment to realize my choice of words, before slapping myself in the face for being an idiot. "No-no, I didn't mean like how we normally do it. I meant like… well... like on a date. Boy and girl… date… thing…"

Her eyes began to widen, before she stuttered out, "A-A date? A date date? Like, someone asking their crush out on a date sort of date?'

"Well… yeah." I scratched my neck, feeling very embarrassed all of a sudden. Maybe this was a bad idea. Welp, no want for naught. I already started, it'd be weird and confusing for her if I backed out now. "I was hoping... we didn't go out as friends… I wanted to be- uh… something more special. Between us."

I could already feel my face going red. I actually noticed that Ruby's face was too.

"I- uh, well, I mean... " She mumbled, looking away from me while fidgeting with her skirt. It took her a while before she finally answered. "I… I've never gone out on a date with a boy before… but… I mean…"

I held my breath in trepidation for her to finish.

…

"Okay."

I breathed in.

Cambridge suddenly popped out of nowhere and threw confetti to the air, blowing on a party blower.

"TOOK YOU LONG ENOUGH!"

We both stared at Cambridge with bewilderment as he danced all the way to the back of the shop.

We looked at each other.

Then I laughed like an idiot.


	3. Metal Impossible Splinter Gear Cells 3

**AN: Sorry for lack of updates. College life. Yakuza 0. New Years. Hope you enjoy.**

 **P.S. I have no idea what the main character's name is. Give your suggestions now or I'll be forced to use something stupid for his name. Like a meme. And only half of you guys would want that.**

* * *

She awoke to her Scroll alarm vibrating underneath her pillow.

With deft hands, the Scroll was barely able to reach its second vibration before Ruby had already deactivated it.

 _It's Sunday!_ She grinned, the first thoughts in her mind already formulating plans for how she'd be spending her entire free day with a certain Ice Cream boy.

Removing her sleeping mask, she wasted no time starting her morning routine. She was the first to enter the restroom as her team began to stir awake from her rather early escapade.

"Ugh… What time is it?" The blonde one in their group mumbled aloud as she rubbed her eyes clear, no doubt feeling quite iffed from being awakened so early.

The Faunus sleeping in the bed right under her poked her tired head out just long enough before shoving herself back in the warm confines of her blanket, moaning, "...it's seven o'clock…"

"Oh my god, why are we waking up even earlier than our usual school day on the weekend…" Yang groaned, stretching her face out with aggravation.

"Mm… Everyone shut up… does no one understand the concept of a beauty sleep…?" The uppity uptight girl of the team growled, smashing a pillow on top of her head to block out all outside noises.

"It's too early for this, I'm going back to sleep…" Yang sighed to herself, laying face down back in her sleeping position.

Blake had already buried herself underneath her blankets to bother responding.

And so the three girls in the room began to slowly drift back to sleep.

…

…

…

Then the shower in their restroom turned on, followed by the booming singing voice of Ruby permeating through the walls.

" _Dream of anything,_ _I'll make it all come true!_

 _Everything you need,_ _Is all I have for youuu!"_

"I can't sleep like this."

"Screw it, I'm waking up."

"Damn that idiot…"

* * *

Weiss went to the restroom after Ruby finally finished taking her shower, which for some reason took a whole lot longer than normal. Now, that alone didn't exactly set off any alarm bells in Weiss's head, she was quite overjoyed at the fact that her team leader/partner was taking her hygiene so seriously. What really irked her though, was when she passed by Ruby after finishing her shower, and saw her… _**brushing**_ her own hair. Happily. With a smile. While humming.

After living in a dormitory room with the tomboy for so long, Weiss knew Ruby better than the back of her own hand. Probably. Well, actually not really. But Weiss knew enough to know that Ruby was not the type of girl that cared about her own hair, preferring to keep it unkempt and messy because she couldn't be bothered.

Now if seeing Ruby tidying up her own hair bothered Weiss so much, then what she saw next _really_ disturbed her.

Ruby actually applying makeup. To her own face. Willingly.

Weiss couldn't help but stare in shock as Ruby dabbed some blush onto her cheeks, before uncapping some light-colored lipstick and spreading it over her lips. Like an actual proper lady.

The heiress had to slap herself a few times to make sure she wasn't actually just dreaming or hallucinating all of this. Was this for real?

Meanwhile as Weiss was too busy questioning the reality of life itself, Blake appeared by Ruby's side. "Ruby, I've never seen you use this desk for anything other than modifying Crescent Rose." She said as she looked over Ruby's simple collection of beauty products. "I didn't think you were the type to get girly. At least not willingly."

Ruby shrugged indifferently at the remark, "Eh, I can be girly too sometimes. Just depends on the occasion." Then with a pop from her lips, she set her lipstick down and started decorating the side of her hair with a colorful hair clip.

Blake raised an eyebrow at that, before asking, "What's the occasion, then?"

"Oh, you know. Something occasional. That's all." Ruby replied vaguely, not elaborating any further. Finished clipping her hair, she turned to face her Cat-ninja teammate and asked, "Do I look alright? It's not too much, is it?"

"No, you look pretty cute. I guess." Blake scratched her head, unsure how to react.

It was only then that she noticed the outfit Ruby was wearing. From behind, she thought Ruby was just still in her pajamas, but she actually changed her clothes to something rather… different. A black short dress with a red polka dot design, a matching skirt reaching her thighs, alongside her usual black stockings. Interestingly enough, she was wearing some small red dress shoes instead of her usual combat boots.

Ruby almost looked like she could be the definition of the word " _girly girl._ " Not that it was a bad look, mind you. It was just unexpected, since she wasn't normally the type.

Blake whistled at the sight. "It's almost like you're preparing to go out on a date with someone." She teased.

"Haha, weird." Ruby chuckled lightheartedly.

Huh. Usually something like that would get a more pouty response. Instead, it was like the teasing just fazed by her like it was nothing. Maybe she was maturing?

Now that all was said and done, Ruby sat up from her desk and prepared to leave- but only after double checking her face and adjusting her dress. Taking a deep breathe, she grabbed her Scroll and passed by a certain stunlocked heiress on her way out. "You know you can catch flies if you keep your mouth open like that, right?" She said, pushing her partner's opened jaw up in proper position, only for it to drop back down again. "Hm." With that, Ruby left the dorm room.

 _Well that was interesting…_ Blake thought to herself.

The door to the restroom opened up as Yang walked out, looking slightly miffed, "Neither of you guys borrowed my hairbrush without asking me, did you?"

Weiss finally knocked herself out of her stupor as she violently shook her head and faced Yang with the most horrified expression on her face, "Yang, I think your sister got kidnapped by aliens and now an evil alien clone took her place and I don't know how to deal with this right now!"

"That sounds like something Ruby would say." Blake blinked.

"I KNOW. I THINK I'M STARTING TO GO CRAZY!" Weiss shouted as she pulled on her hair. "Did I enter some Twilight Zone where everything is the opposite?!"

"Overreaction much, Snow Princess?" Yang chuckled, before explaining, "No, she's probably gotten all tidied up because she has a new boyfriend to impress now."

" **Boyfriend?"** Both Blake and Weiss exclaimed at the same time, looking at each other in shock. Blake then asked, "Wait, when did this happened?"

Yang walked over to the desk Ruby was sitting in and picked up her hair brush, frowning at the strands of dark reddish hair that covered it. Shaking her head in annoyance, she turned to Blake and explained, "You know how Ruby leaves every Sunday for the past few months? Turns out, she's been hanging around with a guy she met that works in an ice cream shop. It looks like they're at that stage in the relationship where they're _finally_ going steady with each other."

"Seriously? But I thought Ruby wasn't comfortable with the idea of dating yet. That seems so unlike her…" Weiss crossed her arms, dumbfounded over the thought of Ruby ever showing any sign that remotely resembled interest towards boys.

"I guess Ruby got lucky and found the ideal guy, someone so perfect that she's finally willing to grow out of her socially awkward shell and start playing the romance game like the rest of us young adults." Plucking out a strand of hair from her brush, Yang sighed wistfully, "They grow up so fast…"

"Well that's nice." Blake smiled at the thought, feeling a sense of pride to see her usually childish friend reach her coming of age. "How come she hasn't shared this with any of us?"

"Two reasons for that;" Yang set aside her hairbrush and brought two fingers up, listing off, "One, she probably doesn't want any of us to make this into a big deal, so she's been keeping it secret the entire time. Two, she's probably terrified that if I ever found out, I'd do something stupid. Like stalking her in the middle of one of her dates like an overbearing sister who's unjustifyingly overprotective of her innocent, naive, and pure baby sister."

Blake snorted, "So, what, are you going to start following her around now?"

The blonde beauty brought her hands up to cover her mouth as she gasped in faux-indignation. "My word! I am shocked and appalled that you would think so little of me, dear partner! I would never be so callous as to invade my own sister's privacy just for the sake of my own selfish- pfffft-" She suddenly burst out laughing, dropping her whole facade before admitting, "Yes, yes I am. I've already been doing it for the past few months, it's how I found out they started dating in the first place."

Blake tiredly sighed, "Go figure..."

"Anyways, I'm almost done preparing so that I can go stalk the lovebird on her first date today. Now that the both of you already know, you wanna come help out?" Yang smiled mischievously. "Eh? Eh? More eyes, the merrier!"

Blake cautiously looked over to Weiss, who was at that point giving her own dubious look. It only took a moment of internal dialogue and face banter between the two before they both shrugged and simultaneously decided, **"Alright."**

"Sweet."

* * *

Now exiting the docked airship, Yang stretched her entire body in preparation for their heist and did a cartwheel flip down the docking ramp. Weiss and Blake followed shortly after, walking like normal and sane individuals.

Landing a perfect ten, Yang posed extravagantly with jazz hands, clearly excited for their personal mission today of stalking their leader in order to stick their dirty dirty noses into Ruby's private personal life.

"I hope you know what you're doing, Yang." Weiss said, unimpressed at Yang's miracle pose. "Ruby already had a head start on us by taking the first airship down here, and we have no idea where her date is supposed to take place. And while I'm sure you might be crazy enough to try it, I'd rather we _don't_ spend our whole day scouring around the city just to find her like that time we did for Blake."

"You really gotta bring that up?" Blake frowned.

"Well I'm sorry, I just really don't want to do that again for something that's even less reasonable than before." Weiss harrumphed, crossing her arms defensively.

Rolling her eyes, Blake turned to Yang, "Despite the prissy attitude, I have to agree with Weiss. Hopefully, you have an actual plan here, Big Sis?"

"Not to worry, my partners in crime!" Yang clapped her hands sporadically. "Before this day even came, I already activated a GPS locating chip and planted it on Ruby!" Pulling out her Scroll, she explained, "All we have to do is follow this blinking dot on the map, and we'll be good to go!"

"You're really taking the word ' _stalking'_ to its most literal definition." The heiress grimaced, finding it truly disturbing how siblings could so easily go to great lengths for situations like these. She briefly wondered if Winter would go to great lengths like that just for her, before realizing that Winter would probably just skip all formalities and straight up kill the poor sap she'd be courting. The thought comforted her and also scared her.

"Should I even ask how you managed to accomplish this?" Blake asked warily, taking hold of the Scroll that was tracking her leader's every step.

It was at that point Yang suddenly had a flashback to a few days earlier…

 _Yang cautiously looked around to make sure no one was looking at her before she opened up the secret compartment she made, wedged inside their team's closet._

 _She pulled out a small discrete box, before quickly jamming the sucker in between her honkers._

 _After that, she went inside the restroom, locked the door, and stayed there for a bit with her ears against the door to make absolutely sure that Ruby wasn't suspicious of her. Satisfied when she heard nothing wrong, she sighed and pulled the small box out of her hoo-ha's._

 _Setting down near the sink, opening the box revealed a small fashionable hair clip, a data chip for a Scroll, as well as a sticky note with graceful cursive handwriting._

 _ **In the event of daughter's first date. Use with care and caution.**_

 _Yang gratefully held her hands together and prayed, "Thank you Summer Rose. Your motherly wisdom knows no bounds and comes into use even during times when we need you most! Rest in peace knowing you can trust me to take on the mantle."_

 _With that done, she installed the data chip into her Scroll and held on to the hair clip like it was the most valuable item in existence._

 _Taking a deep breath, she adopted a carefree smile and called out, "Ruby! I got a gift for you that you might like!"_

"It's not as creepy as you might think, but let it be known that this was planned _years_ in advance." Yang answered cryptically to Blake's inquiry.

Blake just shook her head, "I'm not even surprised at this point."

Clapping her hands together, Yang announced, "Now if we're done standing around and talking about how many boundaries and laws we're going to break just from participating in this mission, let's initiate operation ' _Team RWBY's Making Sure Ruby's First Ever Boyfriend Isn't a Total Creep Who's Totally Trying to Take Advantage of Her For Dirty Things!'_ "

Weiss raised her hand, "I refuse to call it that, but I'm otherwise ready."

Blake raised her hand as well, "Same here."

Yang raised her hand too, setting it in front of her. Blake and Weiss did the same.

" _ **Three… Two… One… BONZAI!"**_ The team flung their hands up and cheered their battlecry in the middle of the docking station, briefly gathering the attention of on goers as they went about their day.

* * *

Ruby blinked, feeling a sudden disturbance in the force. She looked around, feeling very cautious about anyone who might be spying on her.

 _What am I getting so worked up about? Is this just my nerves acting up?_

Figuring that she was probably getting nervous again for her second date, she took a deep breath and pulled out her headphones to listen to some calming music.

Scrolling through her music player, she actually lingered on a new song she downloaded at the recommendation from her boyfriend.

 _ **Neil Cicierega - Wow Wow**_

Might as well listen to it while she was waiting. At least it'd be something she could talk about with him later.

Pressing play, she laid back against a street lamp, and closed her eyes as she was immersed into the musical realm.

…

With a smile, Ruby giggled to herself, "Geez, he has such weird taste in music…"

* * *

Meanwhile, at the top of a nearby rooftop, a blonde stalker laid in hiding as she held her Scroll in one hand and binoculars in the other.

Holding the Scroll against her ear, she called out, "Black Panther, this is Goldilocks. Have you found your position? Over."

" _Affirmative Goldilocks, I am currently within sight and can confirm the target. I should be camouflaged in a tree about fifteen meters from the target to your left. Confirm, over?"_

Yang peered through her binoculars over to the left to find Blake sitting on a tree branch with a fake bird nest on her head.

"Confirmed. I see ya, Panther. Alright, Snowflake, are you within range of target, over?"

" _..."_

Yang blinked at the lack of response and repeated, "Snowflake, are you in position, over?"

" _Are you talking to me?"_ Weiss finally responded.

"There's only three of us! Who else is Snowflake?" Yang grunted.

" _No one. I thought we agreed that my codename would be_ All Dogs Go To Heaven."

"No, you said that _you_ _wanted_ your codename to be _All Dogs Go To Heaven_! Then I said, _'Let's stick with something simpler and just call you Snowflake instead!'_ So your codename is Snowflake!"

" _..."_

"..."

" _Pretty sure I would remember you saying that."_

Yang sputtered in response, clearly flabbergasted. "Are you kidding me right now?!"

" _What's even wrong with my codename?"_

"Does the fact that it takes an entire sentence just to say it not make it sound impractical?! Codenames are supposed to be short and efficient! I could say your full name twice, and it'd still be faster than saying All Dogs Go To Heaven!"

" _Well excuuuse me for trying to be creative and unconventional for once."_

" _Guys, can we please save this argument for the next heist? We already started, so there's seriously no point in talking about this."_ Blake chipped in.

"Fine, whatever!" Yang groaned, before repeating herself, "All Dogs Go To Heaven, are you in your position, over?"

" _Affirmative, Goldilocks. You should find me sitting in the bus stop next to the newstand about twenty feet away from Ruby on your right. Over."_

Yang pointed the binoculars over to her left to see Weiss inconspicuously looking out of a hole in her newspaper as she sat by herself.

"Copy. Everyone has clear visuals on the target? Over."

" _ **Roger."**_

"Good."

Satisfied that nothing had gone wrong just yet, she went back to setting her sights on her sister again. "Can someone describe what she's doing right now?"

Blake took the reins and began giving details, _"Target is currently on her headphones, and tapping her foot in rhythm as she waits for her date."_

"Ruby is probably in her musical trance again. I swear, it's like that girl can forget the entire world around her once she puts those things on." Yang chuckled.

" _Must be listening to something good. I've never seen her get so into a song like this before."_

"Huh. She might have found a new song then."

" _Wait! I see a male incoming! This might be her date!"_ Blake interrupted.

"Okay, where's he coming from? Describe him to me." Yang resumed her tactician persona, frantically searching around to find the second target.

" _Approaching three clicks from the right. Young. Short hair. About six feet in height. White casual hoodies. Also… wolf ears?"_ Blake finished with a shocked tone.

"Yep, that's our guy." Yang smiled, recognizing the male target coming into view.

" _Wait, she's dating a Faunus?"_ Blake asked.

"Wow, Blake, racist much? You get to see Ruby's boyfriend for the first time and the first thing you want to point out is how he's a Faunus?" Yang teased.

" _Yeah, Blake. What's wrong with dating a Faunus? Don't you know I have a friend who's also a Faunus too? How close minded of you."_ Weiss joined in.

" _Oh shut up you two, I'm not complaining. I'm just surprised. It's been a while since the last time I've seen a Human-Faunus relationship."_ Blake clarified, before reminding, _"Also, code names! If this was a real mission, you both would have potentially jeopardized the entire team's identity!"_

"Alright alright, let's get back in the game here folks. What's he up to?"

* * *

I saw Ruby leaning on a street lamp a couple yards away, so I waved my hand as I called out to her. "Hey, Ruby! I'm here!"

Weirdly enough, it didn't seem like she noticed me.

After walking up closer a bit, I saw that she had her eyes closed and her headphones on. She looked like she was deeply engrossed in whatever song she was listening to, to the point where she's pretty much ignoring the outside world.

With my hands behind my back, I innocently smiled to myself as I scooched up and lowered my head next to her to eavesdrop on whatever she was listening to. She didn't even notice my presence.

It sounded familiar… Oh wait, I knew this song! This was the song I told her to download a few weeks earlier. I wonder what she thought of it? It might not be "Casey Williams" good, but it was still catchy enough for my tastes. In fact, it was pretty much the only meme song I had that I loved unironically.

I could tap her and try to get her attention again… Buuuuuut, I really didn't want to interrupt her while she was listening to one of my songs. So instead, I just decided to mess around like an idiot and started dancing in front of her until she decided to open her eyes again.

It sounded like she was halfway through the song, so I might as well have some fun in the meanwhile.

Positioning myself in front of her, I began to show off my moves to the oblivious cutie lost in her own world.

* * *

" _What the hell is he doing?"_ Weiss asked, stupefied at the sight of the Faunus-boy shuffling his feet all over the place.

" _I think… I think he's breakdancing?"_ Blake guessed.

" _What, in the middle of the street for no reason?"_

" _With that mischievous smile, I'd say he's trying to tease her until she notices him."_

"Ooh, I can appreciate a boy with a mischievous sense of humor." Yang whispered, still watching the whole thing through her binoculars.

After a moment of dancing, they saw the Faunus-boy slowly start to get really into his dance routine, doing a backflip before spinning his legs around like a goddamn madman. Then he smoothly transitioned into a handstand with his feet kicked up in a skilled pose.

Yang whistled impressively, "Damn, he's actually pretty good."

" _No kidding. Meanwhile, our girl Ruby has barely opened her eyes to even witness it."_ Blake chuckled.

" _That dolt! How long does she plan on standing there like a mindless idiot for? Has she forgotten that she's supposed to be out on a date?"_ Weiss groaned.

Unable to hold onto his dramatic pose for long, the Faunus-boy's arms started wobbling before his body collapsed and he landed face first into the pavement.

" _I like him so far."_ Blake decided, _"I can see why he might be Ruby's type."_

Weiss hummed in doubt, _"Mmm… I'd rather keep my judgement for later. As of now, I'm still not impressed."_

"Of course you'd say that _Miss Never Settle For Less Than Prince Charming._ " Yang snickered.

" _My codename is All Dogs Go To Heaven!."_ The heiress harrumphed before defensively saying, _"And my personal tastes for men are of no business of yours. Besides, what I think doesn't really matter, does it? We're studying this boy in order to make sure he's the right person for Ruby, not to snatch him away for ourselves the moment we have the chance."_

"Well, I mean…if things don't work out between them, I might just try to swoop in-"

" _That's despicable of you."_ Weiss stated with overwhelming disapprovement.

"Relax! I'm just kidding!" The blonde reassured, regretting making such a tasteless joke in the first place. "I couldn't do that to Ruby anyways. Besides, if he ever breaks up with her, I'd probably just murder him instead."

" _Uhp, Ruby's waking up, you guys."_ Blake interrupted, causing Yang to return to her binoculars again.

* * *

"Why are you on the ground?" Ruby couldn't help but ask as she saw her boyfriend lying there in what could be considered a 'seductive' pose, half-lidded eyes and all.

"Just testing to see how much I could get away with before you snap out of your musical daydream." He answered casually, before swinging his legs around until he managed to bounce up and land back on his feet with much more finesse than she thought he was capable of.

"Pfft, and what exactly were you doing while I wasn't paying attention?"

"Breakdancing."

At that, Ruby raised an eyebrow in doubt, teasing him with, "Breakdancing? No offense, but I really don't see you as the type of person who can handle that level of skill. Not with your noodle arms anyway."

"Ha. Ha. Ha." He dryly laughed, "I would make you eat those words right now, but my arms are tired and I don't want to put in the effort, so shut up."

Giggling, Ruby took her headphones off and pocketed them away before holding her hands behind her back and squirming on her feet like a nervous schoolgirl. With noticeable trepidation, she asked, "So… Um… I decided to dress up for our movie date today…how do I look?"

It took him a moment to study her spruced up appearance before he decided to himself that; yes, she indeed looked much cuter today than she ever had before. Not to say she didn't look cute regularly, but hot diggity dog, she sure knew how to clean up.

Glowing a slight blush, he scratched his neck awkwardly as he looked her straight in the eye and said, "You look lovely."

Ruby smiled as she looked away for a bit. "I'm glad. I was a bit worried that I might have gone overboard with the dress…"

"Honestly, I wouldn't mind seeing you like this more often. It'd be a nice change of pace from the usual gothic lolita theme that you always have on."

With an impish glint in her silver eye, Ruby tilted her head in a cutesy manner before asking, "Oh? Are you asking me to dress myself up more often for you?"

"Uh- b- wha-" The Faunus-boy stammered, flustered over the sudden suggestion. That is, until he realized what she was doing. Shaking his head clear, he regained his cool as he muttered, "You are not as naive and innocent as you make yourself out to be."

"Caught you off guard though, didn't I?" Ruby smirked playfully.

The Faunus chuckled before giving her his hand, "The theater won't be screening our movie for another hour. Wanna look around the city to find something to do in the meantime?"

Smiling back, she took to his side and intertwined her finger with his. "I don't mind. It doesn't have to be just a movie date. We have the whole entire day for ourselves, after all."

"Sweet, let's make sure this date doesn't start off terribly like our first one. As much as I like hanging out at The Mint Factory, the boss said he'll boot us out if we try to use the place as a safe spot for our date again."

"For such a polite old man, he sure can be pushy."

"Oh trust me, I already know firsthand. I mean, have you tried working for the guy? I swear."

They both laughed as they continued on.

* * *

" _I'm amazed she hasn't tripped up and made a complete embarrassment out of herself yet."_ Weiss commented, spying at the couple from the hole in her newspaper.

" _I know, she seems so comfortable around him. It's like they've known each other forever."_ Blake pointed out, _"How come it only took today to find out he even existed?"_

"Ruby knows us too well. If we ever found out that Ruby was going out alone just to hang out with a boy, she knew we would do something crazy and stupid to make her look bad." Yang replied, her binoculars following the two lovebirds like a hawk.

" _You mean stalking her while she's out on a date, hiding in the shadows as we follow needlessly complicated tactics of espionage like the maniacs we are?"_ Weiss guessed.

"Exactamundo." Setting down her binoculars once the lovely couple were out of view, she began to move, "They're heading down Fifth Avenue. Ready to depart?"

" _Relocating to different hiding spot now._ " Blake announced, stealthily sliding down her tree and moving on to the next location.

" _Taking the bus to get ahead of them. Will report back once I've finished scouting."_ Weiss folded up her newspaper disguise just as the bus arrived. Looking nonchalant as ever, she entered the bus alongside the other passengers before it closed the doors and drove on.

Yang flicked her hair back and cracked her stiff neck, donning a confidant grin as she began walking back down the fire escape.

You know, it's almost a shame that she doesn't put this much effort into her studies like she does in stalking her sister. She'd be passing with flying colors at this point, if that were the case.

Hm… Maybe she should open a secret spy business on the side while working as a Huntress once she graduates.

On second thought, nah. That's way too restrictive for her. Besides, she'd probably half-ass it like she does with her studies anyway.


	4. Ruby and Her Date Beats a Man to Death

**AN: Been a while since I updated. The college life is a messy one. I'm worried that my writing might be getting rusty. Leave a review when you finish and tell me if this new chapter is lacking, please?**

* * *

"So, what do you wanna do while we wait?" I asked Ruby as we walked hand-in-hand down the busy streets of Vale.

Ruby hummed in thought, then shrugged as she offered: "Something to kill time until our movie starts, I guess..."

I hummed as well, wondering if maybe we should've agreed to meet up minutes before the movie started instead of meeting in the early morning. But if we did that, we'd spend less time together, so it probably wasn't worth it anyway.

Thinking up ways to spend the day, I decided to say the first thing that popped to mind, "You wanna go to a restaurant or a cafe and get something to eat?"

"We could, but that might not be much different than how we usually hang out back at The Mint Factory…" She frowned, "Plus, I kinda wanna save space for popcorn and soda."

"Good point…" The popcorn already cost a fortune itself, so spending money on more food beforehand would be pretty dumb…

"Let's think of something we haven't done before. Something we usually don't do since we always hang out in the ice cream parlor." Ruby attempted to narrow down the list of activities.

Okay, something we usually didn't do when we were at Mint's ice cream parlor. Hm…

"Wanna go play at the amusement park?"

"Nah, that'd take too much time. We'll probably get tired and forget all about the movies by the time we're done." She shot down. "Let's save that for a future date."

Hm…

Ruby snapped her fingers in a eureka, suggesting, "How about taking a stroll through the public park? That's something romantic couples do, right?"

"Yeah, but it might be too early in the morning for something like that." I explained, "Walking around a park is more of a relaxing activity rather than a time killer. We have too much energy to spend, so walking aimlessly around a pond might make us more restless instead. Let's visit it during the evening, when we're already tired and need a break."

Ruby nodded neutrally, going back to square one.

It was then she and I walked past the door to an arcade building, hearing the noises of button mashing and sound effects from various games.

Both of us gave pause as we watched the kids inside played all sorts of things, like Skee-ball and DDR. Seeing all the strobing lights and chaos inside, we looked at each other with a smile, an idea popping up in our heads simultaneously.

"You thinking what I'm thinking?" She asked rhetorically.

"Cambridge Mint wouldn't seem out of place if he wore a kilt and spoke in a Scottish accent while playing bagpipes?"

"Something along those lines." She playfully stuck her tongue out at she started pulling on my arm, forcing me to follow her, "Come on, let's go in! It's been forever since I've been to an arcade!"

"Alright alright, no pulling!" I chuckled.

* * *

"All Dogs Go To Heaven to Goldilocks. Located the target, over." Weiss said as she leaned against an arcade cabinet, discreetly spying on Ruby and her date as they played a random assortment of games.

" _Great. Where are you guys right now?"_ Yang's voice crackled to life on her Scroll.

Weiss brought the Scroll closer to her as she whispered, "At the arcade on Seventh Avenue. You know, the one between the dry cleaner and barbershop?"

" _They're spending their first date in an arcade?"_ Blake spoke up with a rather disappointed tone, _"That's kinda disappointing. Was sort of expecting something more- you know- romantic. I guess it's not exactly out of character for Ruby, though."_

"Hey, there's absolutely nothing wrong with going to the arcade as a first date! It's miles more exciting than any stuffy and crowded Five-Star restaurant anyway." Weiss huffed.

" _..."_

"..." Weiss blinked, realizing what she just said.

" _Out of the three of us, I was NOT expecting you to admit a bombshell like that."_ Yang said, shocked.

"Well- I mean- whatever. First dates and teenagers and stuff. I mean, arcades are pretty much a stereotype for first dates these days, you know? Like, whatever… I don't care." Weiss fumbled, trying to maintain her natural haughty image.

" _Oh my god, you're a closet nerd for gaming. Oh my god- is that why you suddenly got so good at Total Annihilation the second time we played?! You were actually practicing?!"_

"Shut up! Can we get back on topic and focus on stalking Ruby now? Pleeaase?!" Weiss groaned, hoping for Yang to just drop the issue.

There was a silent pause for a moment before Yang decided to move on, _"Alright, back to Ruby. Panther and I are on our way to your location. In the meanwhile, keep your eyes on Ruby, and don't blow your cover."_

With a relieved sigh, Weiss nodded affirmatively to herself, "Roger."

" _Goldilocks to All Dogs Secretly Play Video Games, signing off."_

Then the call got disconnected before Weiss could even react. Weiss's eye twitched violently, then she took a deep breath and silently groaned.

Leaving that mess behind her finally, she peeked around the corner and resumed her mission to spy on Ruby and her date.

Currently, the two were finishing a match of skeeball. Judging by the victorious grin on the Faunus-boy's face and the sore pouting from Ruby, he had the upper hand.

"You totally cheated! You can't just throw the balls directly at the holes! That defeats the entire purpose of the game!"

"Oh wazzat? Is that the cry of a natural marksman lamenting over the fact she just got her butt beaten by a total noob?! Better call the Discovery Channel to record this, because they ain't never getting another chance to witness an endangered species like this again!"

"What does that even meeaaaan?! Why am I an endangered species?!"

"Cuz I'm an apex predator that's about to wipe out your entire career, baby!"

"Nooo!"

Seeing their banter go on somehow brought an amused smile on Weiss's face. Now that she was able to witness more of their interactions, she was starting to agree with Blake about how natural Ruby behaved around this boy.

It was the sort of natural familiarity that couldn't be faked or replicated through different means. The only other boy Weiss knew that could make Ruby act this natural was Jaune. Although, she had to admit that not even Jaune could match up to the extent this boy had managed to bring out of Ruby.

The way she would make faces at him the same way she would make a face at Yang after being teased, or the silly laugh and smile after the whole playful fighting was over… It spoke volumes about how far Ruby had allowed this young man past her initial wall of social ineptitude that usually surrounded her when with strangers and acquaintances.

Weiss had to wonder who was the first out of the two to open themselves up for this relationship to get started.

As the two move away, Weiss slithered around the walls and arcade machines to follow, ignoring the strange looks people were giving her. Reaching around the corner, she saw them stop to gawk at a certain game booth that was advertising something about a new virtual reality experience.

"Ooh, this looks new and high tech." Ruby commented, bedazzled by the futuristic design and chromatic colors of the booth. "What kind of rail shooter is this?"

"I think this uses the new VR headset all the commercials keep talking about. Instead of using holograms, it's more like attaching two giant screens to the front of your face so that it made you feel like you were actually IN the game." The Faunus explained.

"That actually sounds kind of cool! How come I haven't heard anyone talk about it yet?"

"It hasn't hit mainstream popularity yet, I think. Anyone can buy a headset for themselves, but it'll set you back about 600 Lien. Not only that, but it requires a really powerful high-end computer for it to even work properly, so you'd need to invest another thousand or so beforehand. Basically, to get the full seamless _Virtual Reality_ experience, you'd need almost two thousand Lien."

"Wow… That's kinda insane…" She mumbled.

"That's for the headset and computer alone, mind you. There's a bunch of other separate gear and accessories like motion controllers and portable backpacks and swivel stands that cost separately, all of which are about as expensive."

Ruby walked up to the booth and read from the poster, "It says a session only costs a single token each to play."

"Wait, for real?"

"Seems like a steal." Ruby turned around, "You wanna give it a shot-"

She recoiled when her date suddenly vanished without a trace. Spinning around in confusion, she called out, "Scooper Boy?"

" _I'm already in the booth, come on already ya slowpoke!"_

Laughing in surprise, Ruby shook her head with a smile and went in the booth with him.

Meanwhile, Weiss raised an eyebrow as she wondered how in the world she was supposed to spy on Ruby now that her view was blocked by the booth's curtains.

She couldn't just follow her inside, she'd be spotted immediately.

With a sigh, she muttered, "Just my luck…" Then, she looked around for a discreet place to sit, walked over, and began to stare at the game booth for an indefinite amount of time.

All the while, she did her best to ignore the tiny little voice in her head that was jealous about how she couldn't get to watch them play.

* * *

"Alright, so, how do I use this?" Ruby asked as her virtual avatar aimlessly waved her motion controllers in the air.

Both of us had already equipped our headsets and were comfortably placed in the middle of a Sci-fi rooftop. Literally everything that we could see was outlined by of a colorful neon aesthetic.

Waving my motion controller at Ruby, I explained, "So these basically act as your hands and let you interact with things in the game. The two trigger buttons in front control your fingers. Top trigger controls your pointer, bottom controls the rest."

Ruby tested out her virtual fingers, opening and closing her hands with fascination. "Ooh, futuuuure."

"The buttons on top of the controller do everything else. Opens the UI menu, probably switches guns, etcetera etcetera." I started pressing random buttons until my virtual hand was replaced with a weird space gun thing. "Right now, we're playing a game about defending a giant tower from space aliens- or whatever it is that's invading. Basically imagine this as any rail shooter game you've ever played, but in virtual reality."

"Sounds simple enough." Ruby stared at her hands until she also summoned a gun. As she started randomly shooting everywhere around her like a maniac, she asked excitedly, "Where's the start button?! Let's get to shooting!"

At her behest, I aimed my gun at the giant title screen in the sky and watched it shatter into pieces, before an announcer shouted out the start of the first wave.

As the first group of alien virus monster things spawned, Ruby suddenly exclaimed, "Whoever gets the higher score doesn't pay for popcorn!" Before taking aim and already gunning down the group.

"Aw come on, no fair! You gotta warn me before we start!" With my competitive spirit flaring up, I did my best to catch up with Ruby before she overtook me.

"Apex predatoooor!" She echoed my earlier words against me.

* * *

Blake looked around after entering the arcade doors. She stood on her toes, craning her head around in order to spot Ruby, her date, or maybe even Weiss.

"Where are they?" She muttered to herself.

It took a moment before she managed to spot Weiss just a few feet away. Curiously enough, Weiss was occupying herself by playing one of the arcade cabinets, judging by the fake assault rifle in her hands.

"Huh. She actually does play video games." Blake raised an eyebrow, before moving up to meet with the closet-gamer. Tapping on Weiss's shoulder, she announced her presence with an old fashioned, "Hey."

"Blake!" Weiss was startled from her game, nearly dropping her weapon as she tried her best to compose herself. "Blake, this isn't… Um, it isn't what you think it is! I was just bored and curious and I saw some kids playing and Ruby was taking a long time so I just-"

Weiss suddenly went silent, as Blake looked at her with a dubious expression.

"You know what? I don't care anymore." Weiss proclaimed in a bored tone, going back to her shooting spree as if nothing ever happened.

"Okaaaay…" Blake drawled out, before asking, "Anyway, where's our target? Is she still nearby?"

"Yeah, the doofus and dweeb power couple are inside that VR booth." Weiss pointed as she launched a grenade at a terrorist helicopter.

Blake looked over at where Weiss pointed, seeing the flashing lights from behind the booth curtains. "Is she still in there?"

"For the past half hour or so, yes." Weiss replied, gaining a power up that allowed her to shoot a flamethrower as she wildly flailed her rifle with reckless abandon.

Blake stepped back to avoid getting hit, before commenting "Yeesh."

"Yeah."

" _B-B-B-Bonus round!"_

Blake stood by and watched casually as Weiss hit a series of targets without missing a shot or breaking a sweat.

 _Huh. That looks pretty fun, actually..._ Blake thought to herself.

Still spectating on the side, she asked, "How long do you think they'll stay in there?"

"Who knows? If that boyfriend of her's is anything like Ruby at all, they'll probably be at it for the next five hours or so."

Blake chuckled, "Heh, that would definitely make this stalking mission a lot easier on us."

Weiss stayed silent as she was able to perfectly land every shot in the bonus round, leading to the game screen blowing up in confetti and dramatic fanfare. As the game transitioned to the high score screen, Weiss sighed in relief, and then used her gun to shoot the letters of her initials in the sixth place slot.

"Sooo… Uh… How do you play this game?" Blake leaned in curiously.

* * *

"WOO! THIRD HIGHEST SCORE!" Ruby shrieked as she jumped for joy, before singing like a braggart, "You have to pay for the popcorn~! You have to pay for the popcorn~!"

I dramatically sunk to my knees as I looked on in exaggerated horror over the fourth score slot. Ruby had managed to get only twenty points above me. So close…

"NOOOO! MY LEGACYYYY!"" I cried out in pure anguish, reaching out for the high score before slumping my body like a man with no will left to live.

You could almost hear the organists playing the song of my demise.

"Hey, how long have we been playing, by the way?" Ruby called.

Standing again, I tilted my headset up and checked my Scroll. "Huh. We still got another half hour left before our movie starts."

"You wanna keep playing?"

"Nah. I'm sad, tired, and depressed because I lost at a video game to my girlfriend, and now I wanna go sulk in a corner until the end of the world comes." I sighed, taking my headset off and setting my equipment back on its stand.

"Pfft. Neeeerd." Ruby teased, setting her headset down as well before rushing to my side and jumping onto my back. "So what do you wanna do now?"

I faltered from the sudden weight, doing my best to hold both of us up and not fall flat on my face for the second time today. With a valiant struggle, I replied, "Eugh- I dunno... L-Let's just aimlessly w-wander around town until our movie starts."

"Ah yes. What every girl dreams of doing on a romantic date." Ruby bit back lightheartedly, before giggling into my shoulder.

My weak upper body strength couldn't handle it anymore and I fell flat on my face again. "OOF."

* * *

"So I don't shoot the construction workers?" Special Unit Marksman Blake Belladonna asked, gunning down waves of masked terrorists before they could arm a devastating nitro bomb and launch it into the sky to destroy the world.

"Obviously, no! Would you shoot construction workers in real life in this sort of situation?" Donut-Eating Plays-By-His-Own-Rules Police Officer Weiss Schnee retorted, shooting a rocket launcher that she stole from a random floating box in the air.

"Well I mean, you never know what could happen when it comes to terrorists. They might be trying to blend in with the civilians and shoot you in the back when your guard is down." Blake argued. "That's a thing that happens, you know."

"Yes, well, in this game, that never happens. Don't shoot the construction workers."

"What about the skimpy secretary girls that keep popping up in the weirdest places?"

"Don't shoot them either! The girls aren't a threat in this game!"

"But a woman has as much capacity of being a criminal as a man can. Isn't it a little bit suspicious that they all happen to be wearing such revealing outfits in a deadly working environment? None of them are even wearing helmets. Narratively speaking, they don't match the setting."

"Well this game was created by two old guys who were both named Eric and they probably wanted to have something titillating to encourage players and this game is a beloved classic in a long running franchise so shut up and don't think about it!"

"Who leaves a giant minigun unattended in a bathroom stall? That's completely irresponsible."

"Ugh, you're impossible!"

In the middle of this banter, the screen flashed red before giving the game over screen. Weiss facepalmed in shame at the abysmal score, while Blake was breathing heavily from such a workout.

"So, how did we do?" Blake asked.

"Welp, considering we died during the second level… again… without even reaching the first miniboss." Weiss rubbed her eyebrows, before sighing in exasperation and went, "Not too bad."

"Oh. Good." Blake smiled, unaware of Weiss's aggravation. "I had fun."

"Glad one of us did." Weiss deadpanned, turning her head away just in time to see Ruby and her date walk out of their booth.

"Oh shoot!" Weiss suddenly hissed, pushing Blake down behind the cabinet, "Ruby's leaving!"

The girls peeked their heads out from behind the arcade cabinet, staring at the smiling couple as they walked out the door.

Weiss and Blake looked at each other, nodding in understanding before carefully making their way to follow after them.

Blake already had her Scroll out to call Yang. As soon as she picked up, Blake began, "Be advised, Goldilocks. Targets have exited the building. We are in pursuit. Stay clear out of their sight!"

" _Copy that. Will stay cautious of target's line of sight."_

* * *

Little did those children know, as they all left the building, there had been a third-party prowling around within the shadows.

An adult man, probably in his thirties, had a crazed look in his eyes ever since he saw both Ruby and her date leave the VR booth. His slouched figure dashed into the booth and immediately donned the headset.

What he witnessed next caused him to scream in terror.

"MY HIGH SCORE! NOOOOOOO!"

His disfigured and unsightly-bagged eyes bulged as he saw his name and highscore placed underneath two unfamiliar initials. Where he was once so close to reaching second place, he had now been demoted due to two young teenagers beating his score.

Fifth place.

This man, nay, this creature, he was angry. NAY, perhaps even absolutely livid to extremity! How dare these children undermine all of his hard work, all of his efforts, all of his training, just to get as high as he did, only for them both to crash his entire foundation down the drain?!

It was maddening, it was sickening, it was absolutely unacceptable!

Perhaps any other person would shrug off such an insult to their name. Perhaps any other **PATHETIC PLEBEIAN** would say that it was just a game, and that they would try harder next time to get their highscore back.

Not this man. NO, he reFUses tO alloW tHis mockery and iNsult to staND! These children MUST PAY for making the last five months of his life worthless, they must PAY for making him waste two hundred tokens THAT WERE ALL SPENT IN PERFECTING AND MASTERING THIS WONDERFUL GAME.

They have insulted, demeaned, and undermined- not just any average man- but a professional, NO, a master, NO, A GOD!

They have insulted A GOD OF VR SHOOTERS.

FOR THAT, THEY MUST PAAAAAAY!

And so this disgusting abomination that resembled an adult man sprinted out of the building in order to, "make them pay for beating my high score in a children's arcade game."

And nobody who saw him called the police.

* * *

Ruby looked on curiously as her date started rummaging around in his pockets, searching for something.

"So here's our tickets, by the way. Forgot to give them to you." He said, handing the pair of tickets over to Ruby.

Rubbing her thumb against the title, she slowly read out, "' _Attorney at Dawn: Trials of Love.'_ Huh. Never heard of it. Is it some sort of romantic movie?"

"I think so. It premiered a few weeks ago, and a whole bunch of movie critics are praising it like it's the cure for cancer. I figured it might… well… match the mood. I guess." He paused, rubbing his neck nervously and looking away.

 _Match the mood?_ Ruby raised an eyebrow.

It was at that moment when Ruby had a scene from an old TV series pop up in her mind, about a guy asking a cute girl out to the movies, and midway through, he would try to put the moves on her by faking a yawn and stretching his arms around her shoulder.

Seeing her date fidget around like this, Ruby couldn't help but laugh, "Oh my God! You were planning to do that dumb cheesy fake yawn move and try to cuddle up to me, weren't you? In the middle of a romantic movie!"

Faltering in his steps, his face blushed a bright red as he stammered, "What?! Nah, no way, nuh uh! I mean, why would I do something so cheesy and lame? That's like the oldest trick in the book! Only old farts do something so… uh…"

Ruby interrupted him by hugging him from behind, whispering, "How about this? If you manage to find the perfect opportunity to pull that move off during the movie, I'll let the fact that you're such a lame old fart slide." With a giggle, she let go and grabbed his hand before moving on.

With a blink, the Wolf-boy recovered himself and followed after her with a scoff, "Pfeh. I am _not_ a lame old fart."

"Are so!" Ruby sang.

"Am not!"

" _Lame old faaart! Laaaaaame old faaaaaaart!"_ She sung even louder in the middle of the streets.

* * *

" _What's this about being a lame old fart?"_ Blake's voice crackled on the Scroll.

"They're probably just teasing each other." Yang replied, stalking from afar with a bored attitude. "Man, I wish that hair clip had a hidden microphone. I want to hear what they're talking about!"

" _Wait, if you had a GPS tracker, then how come you didn't get a microphone too?"_ Weiss asked.

"It didn't come with the emergency protocol box."

" _Protocol box? What?"_

"Don't worry about it." Yang waved away vaguely.

The three stalkers continued to follow the lovely couple from a distance away, never allowing them to escape from their watchful eyes. But after about five minutes passed of just purely watching the two, Yang started to grow incredibly bored. Incredibly, utterly, stupidly boreeeed. She saw Ruby burst out laughing at whatever her date said, which caused Yang much frustration over the fact that she couldn't hear a single thing since she was so far away.

With a hopeful tone, she asked her partners in crime, "Are either of you guys in a position where you can somehow eavesdrop on them without giving yourselves away?"

" _Well I'm not exactly equipped to look natural in the streets, Goldilocks. I'm pretty sure Ruby is perceptive enough to figure out it's me if I get too close."_ Weiss scoffed from the other sidewalk across the street, using her newspaper camouflage as usual.

"Panther, what about you?"

" _Mmm…"_ Blake hummed, before answering, _"Maybe. Give me a second, I'll try to sneak around and see what I can do."_

At that, Yang saw a shadowy blur pop out from the third story of a random window, before seeing it jump from pole to pole and building to building while getting closer to Ruby and her date.

"Awesomesauce." Yang smiled.

Both Yang and Weiss continued to followed after the lovebirds quietly, carefully moving from cover to cover in the most inconspicuous manner possible.

Blake, in the meantime, had gone out of her way to blend in with the shadows using her CAT NINJA powers as she tailed the couple, hiding behind the smallest objects she could possibly fit. Using her CAT NINJA powers, she leaned her head in as close as possible to the two without sticking out too much.

" _Okay… Something about a movie…"_ Blake started conveying, " _'No, don't worry, it's not in 3D.' 'Good, because that's just a lame gimmick that can hurt your eyes anyway.' 'That's weird, I thought you would be into that…' 'Watching a movie in 3D gives me headaches and the effects aren't even that good anyway-' It doesn't seem like they're talking about anything substantial."_

"Uuuugh! Boooorinnng." Yang drawled. "C'mon Wolf-guy! Can't you make the moves on her or something to make her all flustered?! Ruby has the cutest reactions!"

" _From what I'm seeing here, he doesn't seem like the type."_

"I know he isn't! I just wish something lovey-dovey would happen already! Not the same friendly platonic boring conversations that they've been having for the past three months!"

" _Wait, hold on guys. Are you both seeing this right now?"_ Weiss interrupted. _"From behind."_

Yang stopped in her tracks and turned around to find a… some guy… lurking nearby. It was the weirdest sight, like something you'd see in an old creepy horror show. Like that guy, Igor, from that one copyrighted movie that nobody is allowed to name.

"Uh… Yeah. What is up with that guy?" Yang asked, feeling a bit disturbed by his appearance and behavior.

" _I think that guy is heading towards Ruby!"_

" _Wait, what?! Are you sure?"_ Blake stopped in place, turning around to face what could potentially be a threat.

"Is he a mugger? A kidnapper? A pedophile?!" Yang began to worry, seeing the strange disfigured man grow closer and closer towards the oblivious lovebirds.

" _I have no idea, but he definitely does not sound like he wants to have a friendly chat."_

"juStice! JUstice! I Will hAVe Juust Ice!" Yang could hear the crazy guy's rambling all the way from her position.

"Doesn't matter anymore! Engage! Engage and ask questions later! GO GO GO!" Yang commanded before sprinting after the guy.

Weiss and Blake followed suit, jumping out of their cover to attack.

* * *

"JUUSTIIICE- OOF-"

 _Hm?_ My wolf ears flickered as I heard something weird behind us.

But when I looked back, there was nothing there.

"Something wrong?" Ruby asked in concern.

I furrowed my eyes inquisitively, "Did you hear something behind us?"

"Mmm… No _p_ e." She popped for emphasis, "I don't think so. Why, did your ears pick up something?"

"..." I stood still for a moment, concentrating on my hearing to see if it wasn't just my imagination.

…

"I thought I did. Guess not though." I shrugged before continuing on.

"Weird. Do your wolf-ears hear things often?"

"Eh, potentially. Perks of being a Faunus is that the animal ears help me hear things from far away, and can pick up even the smallest noise that's nearby."

"I know a Faunus with cat ears who experiences the same thing. Seems like it could be useful."

"Actually, it's more annoying than not. See, in the apartment I live, there's this really annoying wooden plank on the floor that keeps creaking at night, and it has been killing my sleeping schedule-"

* * *

Meanwhile, in a random dirty alley in the middle of the street, three young girls were beating up a weak and defenseless creature in the corner, kicking it repeatedly to submission as it curled into a fetal position.

"Ow- stop- ow- I give up- Uncle- ow!" The poor abomination shrieked as it was being endlessly pummeled.

After several minutes passed and the three girls were absolutely sure that the crazy man was properly subdued and wouldn't lash out to attack, they forced his beaten rotten body upright and held him against the brick walls.

"Alright, talk!" Yang shouted in a commanding voice, "Are you a mugger? Are you a kidnapper? DO YOU FIDDLE WITH LITTLE KIDS?!"

"W-what?" The man croaked in confusion.

"Answer me god dammit! Who do you work for?! Who sent you?! You almost ruined my little sister's first date with her first boyfriend!"

"Wait- stop- please! You don't understand!" The man raised his hands up out of fear, "I'm not a thief! I wasn't trying to rob or kidnap anyone!"

"Then what the hell was all that screaming about ' _Justice Justice Justice?_ ' You looked like a complete maniac who's gone postal!" Weiss spoke up with an accusatory glare.

"Please Weiss, let me handle this." Yang raised a hand up to block Weiss, before clearing her throat. "Ahem… WHAT SHE SAID!" She yelled, raising a threatening fist at him.

"You guys don't get it! Those two kids did something terrible to me! They've done something that I can never forgive them for! I just wanted revenge for the suffering they've caused!" He sobbed, "Please believe me."

The three girls looked at each other with varying doubtful expressions, before Blake asked the man, "What exactly did our friend do to you that caused you to be so mad?"

"My hard work! My life savings! All of my progress! They took all of it away from me!" He explained with tears in his eyes, "Everything I've ever worked for was ruined because of those two! Unless I get my revenge, I'll have nothing else in this world to live for! They've ruined me!"

"Hard work?" Weiss echoed.

"Life savings?" Blake widened her eyes.

"Nothing... else to live for?" Yang slowly lowered her fist.

Team WBY looked at one another once again, this time with worried expressions.

"Yang, do you know anything about this?" Blake asked.

"No, never! I mean… I know I've said that I've stalked those two before, but that doesn't mean I do it every time they hang out together…" Yang responded in an unsure tone.

"You don't think that dolt has been hanging out with the wrong influence, do you?" Weiss worriedly covered her mouth.

"Is there more to her date than what we originally thought? Is he… actually a criminal?" The cat ninja scrunched her brows in thought.

"B-but Ruby would never hang out with a guy like that! She hates injustice more than anyone else in the world! She's not capable of committing crimes!"

"But it's her first time being in love… right?" Blake pointed out.

Yang blinked before doubt started to spread in her mind. "I mean… she's still kind of a naive kid… she can be impressionable sometimes when she wants to try to fit in with others…"

"Do you guys think… the boy she's dating is actually taking advantage of her feelings to teach her how to commit crimes?"

"Oh my god…" Yang had a horrified expression, wondering if it was all true, if her worst fears were confirmed.

" _Hey Yang. It's me, your sis. Sorry I haven't called in a while, I've been hanging out with my baad~ boyfriend. We've been having fun beating up and robbing people ever since we started dating. By the way, I've decided to stop being a Huntress. My boyfriend said that Hunters and authorities are all narcs that only exist to keep us wild people down with their law systems. Anyway, torch all of my lame baby stuff back home for me, will ya? I'm gonna rob a bank just for the thrills and excitement now to prove that I'm baad~. With my boyfriend. Only bad boys date bad girls. You know how it is. Ciao."_

And then she screamed at the image of a biker-clothes wearing Ruby with tattoos flipping her the bird as she rode off on a motorcycle without a protective helmet on.

Snapping out of her nightmare, she lowered her head to be face to face with the man, screaming, "WHAT EXACTLY DID THEY DO?! WHAT DID THEY STEAL FROM YOU?! TELL ME EVERYTHING! PLEASE!"

The disfigured and bruised man stuttered in fear, "They…"

"Yes?!"

"T-They…"

"YES?!"

"T-They b-b-beat…"

"They beat _WHAT?!_ Your body?! Your pet dog?! Your mother?! WHO DID THEY HURT?!"

"My hiiiighscoooore!" The man cried out, bursting into tears out of frustration and fear.

The group was stunned silent, watching over the man they'd cornered as he sobbed uncontrollably and sputtered out noises similar to a dying dolphin.

…

Still not recovered from their stupor, they slowly looked at each other again with blank stares.

"Highscore." Yang repeated.

"Yyyeeeesss!" The man bawled.

"Today?" Blake asked, expressionless.

"Yes! Yes!"

"Literally five minutes ago at the arcade, where we all just left?" Weiss pointed behind her.

"Yes! Yes! YES!"

"And that's why you were going crazy and why you were about to assault them? Because they beat your highscore in a game?" Yang summarized.

"And now you understand my pain and suffering…" He sniffed, wiping his tears with his dirty stained sleeves.

…

"Well that's understandable." Weiss said with a pleasant smile.

"R-Really?" The man smiled back with hopeful eyes.

Then they all pulled out their weapons.

And nobody who saw them called the police.

* * *

 **Please review and let me know if I've gotten rusty or not. It's been a while since I've written stories.**


	5. Jaune Arc Shows Up At The Last Minute

**AN: The currency in this world is called Lien. We have no conversation rate as of this moment to know what 1 Lien is worth is USD, but I created a word called Fiat that represents the word Cent. So, for something to be worth $3.50 in the RWBYVERSE, it would be written as**

 **3 Liens and 50 Fiats.**

 **This is now canon in the RWBYVERSE, and Rooster Teeth now owes me money for this idea. Preferably, not in Fiats.**

* * *

 _Oh crap, this is the last day "Sailor Sentai Hunters: North Star's Fist" will be in theaters!_

I tried my best to stop twitching as I looked at the extremely cool movie poster for my favorite Sentai Ranger series.

I peeked at Ruby as she looked over the poster curiously. She probably didn't know what it was about.

Not a lot of people in Vale did. After all, it was more mainstream in Mistral and Menagerie. The entire Sentai franchise had a very niche market when it came to the other Kingdoms, and this movie being released here was probably an attempt to branch out to a wider audience. Ever since I heard that this movie was going to be in theaters in Vale, I tried my best to fit it into my busy schedule.

WHICH WAS WHY I WAS SO UPSET AT MYSELF-

God dammit! What should I do, what should I do?! I completely forgot about my plans to watch this movie! Today was my only chance to watch it before it'd be taken down and publishers always took a month before finally releasing it on DVD!

AGH, but I was on a date with Ruby! I couldn't just bail on her while we already have plans! I wanted this date to actually be special and not ruined like before!

AAAGH BUT SAILORSENTAIHUNTERSNORTHSTARSFIST AAAGH IT WAS MY FAVORITE SENTAI OUT OF THEM ALL **AAAAAAAGH**

Maybe I could pretend that we were going to watch this movie instead? No wait, I already showed her my tickets. She already knew what we were going to watch.

If I told her I changed my mind on the movie, would she get disappointed? Would she get angry? Oh god, what if she got angry. What if she got so angry that she'd break up with me?

Was Ruby capable of that type of anger? No, what was I saying? Of course not.

But she'd be really sad. Sad and depressed and hurt and frail and she'd probably try to distance herself away from me before leaving a farewell note in my pocket and never coming to visit me again-

 _I CAN'T RUIN THIS DATE._

* * *

 _Oh my god, they made a Sailor Sentai Hunter movie?!_

Ruby excitedly twitched in place as she and her date stared at the amazingly extravagant poster of her favorite Sentai Ranger series.

The Sentai franchise had always been an integral part of her childhood. From as far back as she could possibly remember, she had always admired the powerful and extravagant jumpsuit-wearing teenagers who could change into their costumes at a press of a button, and go out defeating giant monster bad guys with their giant robot mech.

Out of all the Sentai series though, Sailor Sentai Hunters had a special place in her heart as one of the inspirations that lead her to pursue a life of heroism! Their special message that everyone had the potential for greatness, even the smallest and weakest person, touched her heart and inspired her to follow in her family's footsteps to become a Huntress!

Now here she was, in front of a poster that showed a Sailor Sentai Hunter movie, with a sticker attached saying that today was the last day of screening. GAH, if she knew that this movie existed, she would have bought tickets the moment it came out!

But it might not be too late! If she went and bought tickets now-

Wait…no, she couldn't. She was on a date with her boyfriend today. They were going to see an entirely different movie.

She took a quick glance at him to see him looking curiously at the poster, having no idea how valuable it was to her.

Ruby silently sighed to herself: the Sentai Franchise was never that popular in Vale. She and a few dozen others were probably the only fans to even have known about the franchise's existence within the kingdom.

Man… She wanted to watch this movie, desperately.

She wondered if she could somehow convince her date to go watch this movie instead? Oh, but then she realized that he had already bought tickets to that Attorney Love Trial thing… that would definitely be a waste of money...

Hm… that if she told him that she'd be willing to pay for the tickets instead?

Wait, no! What were even the odds of him being interested in the Sentai series? If they ended up going, and she was the only one to have any fun, then the date would end up being awkward and one-sided.

 _Ugh, and that would leave a terrible impression on him since we already had our first date turn sour because of that stupid circus. Maybe he'll start to think dating me was a bad idea, or we weren't meant to be, and it'll be awkward everytime I come over to visit him at the Mint Factory and he'll probably try his best to distance himself away from me before leaving a farewell note behind and won't let me visit him ever again-_

OKAY, YEAH, NOPE, SHE WAS NOT RUINING THIS DATE.

* * *

"What movie will it be, you two?" The cheerful movie attendant asked in her booth.

The boy handed her two tickets with a strained smile, "We'll be watching this one, thanks!"

"Oh, you already have tickets?" The attendant took his tickets and punched a hole through them before handing them back, "Well you got here just in time. Movie starts in five minutes. Hope you two lovebirds enjoy it!"

"Oh yes, of course! I sure am excited to watch this romantic love story with my girlfriend!" The boy laughed forcefully. "How about you Ruby?"

"Definitely! I am looking forward to seeing lawyers and attorneys falling in love and stuff! There's nothing else I'd rather do!" The girl replied, giving an equally-forced smile and laugh.

"That is so good to hear!"

"Great! I am so happy right now!"

Their smiles and laughs started to slowly devolve into something much more creepy and depressing as they went inside, leaving the attendant extremely bewildered.

"The hell was that all about?" She asked herself, scratching her head confusedly.

Meanwhile, while she wasn't paying attention, three mysteriously-colorful stalkers snuck past her.

* * *

"Huh. So it actually turned out to be a movie date." Yang muttered, "Kind of cliche for a first date, don't you think?"

Team WBY hid behind some conveniently-placed poles that were conveniently wide enough for a person to conveniently hide behind. Convenient.

"Large popcorn, please. Extra butter." The Faunus-boy ordered, taking out his wallet.

"Ooh, and two Orange Fizzle Sodas!" Ruby said cheerfully, laying down her own Lien on the table.

"Woah, wasn't I supposed to pay for food and drinks?" Her date looked at her in surprise.

"Pfft. I said you'd only have to pay for popcorn if I won the higher score, silly! I can pay for our drinks!"

"Oh Ruby. You're too nice for your own good…" Yang sighed happily. "If it was me, I would have definitely taken advantage of this date and drained him dry for every Fiat he has."

"Maybe that's why you'll never find a long-lasting, stable relationship." Weiss chuckled.

"Hey Weiss. Shut up."

Weiss stuck her tongue out in response.

Bringing the topic back around, Blake started with, "Which movie do you think they'll be watching?"

"If I know Ruby, she'd choose that Sentai Ranger movie. She used to watch those type of kid shows a lot back when she was just a little girl. I have no idea about Wolfy's personal taste though."

Blake blinked, asking, "You're calling him Wolfy?"

"Yeah, I completely forgot what his name was." Yang shrugged, "Sue me."

"They're on the move!" Weiss hissed, bringing the entire team's attention back on track.

Ruby had already begun scarfing down her share of the popcorn as the two of them walked down the aisle towards their movie.

"Careful not to choke to death before we even get the chance to reach our seats." Her date warned, sipping his fizzy drink.

"Whaaat? You can't choke from a piece of popcorn!" Ruby scoffed playfully, not before swallowing and chomping down on more.

"You sure about that, Rubes? You sure that's a fact?" He deadpanned.

Once they got out of sight, Blake suddenly squealed excitedly as she realized where the lovebirds were heading, nearly startling Weiss and Yang out of their hiding spots.

"What?! What's wrong?!" Yang asked, worried about her partner's sudden sanity loss.

"I know which movie they're going to watch!" Blake gushed in her pants, "They're going to see the new _Attorney at Dawn: Trials of Love_! Based on the book of the same name, which was written by the same author who made the first two _Ninjas of Love_ before the series was passed on to her sister!"

"Uh… Okay?" Yang furrowed her brows, having no clue what the big deal was.

Blake grabbed Yang by the scruff of her neck and brought her face-to-face, "We need to make sure Ruby stays in a relationship with this boy forever! He is clearly a man of taste and also a mastermind if he managed to convince **Ruby** of all people to watch this movie with him!"

With that, Blake jumped out of her hiding spot and hastily followed after the two before she managed to miss anything crucial. Yang and Weiss were left behind in the dust, both looking on at the Cat Ninja with befuddled expressions.

" _Ninjas of Love_ is that dumb smut story that Blake likes to read, right?" Weiss asked.

"Yeah…" Yang gave a heavy sigh.

"I have a bad feeling about this."

"Yeah..." Yang sighed even heavier.

* * *

Ruby and I sat down in our seat without much trouble, allowing ourselves to get comfy before the movie started. This whole place was almost half-full, with everyone whispering to themselves in anticipation. Strangely enough, the audience for this movie mostly consisted of older women. I guess that made sense, this was a romance drama after all.

I looked over at Ruby just as she looked over at me.

I smiled.

She smiled back.

I was still just a little bit miffed that I wouldn't be able to watch the new Sailor Sentai Hunters…. but honestly, Ruby was more important. I'd get another chance to watch the movie once it came out on DVD. Plus, I might be able to convince Ruby to watch it with me later and maybe get her to become obsessed with the entire series, if not the whole franchise itself.

Hopefully, at least. There might be the chance she thought it was lame, weird, or childish...

But that stuff could be worried about later. Right now, I just wanted to enjoy a dramatic romance movie with Ruby in peace, and possibly snuggle up to her once I got the chance.

I'd pounce on the opportunity when she least expected it! It'd be perfect!

* * *

Ruby sat in her seat right next to the Faunus-boy with a happy hum, excited for the movie to finally start. She looked around to see the entire place half-crowded, mostly filled with older women for some reason.

Then she looked over at her date to see how he was doing, only to find him looking over at her.

He smiled.

Ruby smiled back.

So she would miss the chance to watch the new movie about her favorite Sentai series. Big deal! What was more important to her right now was the date with her _boyfriend_! Besides, even though she wouldn't be able to watch the Sentai movie today, she'd get another chance later when it eventually got released on DVD. It probably wouldn't take that long to come out anyway. Ooh, and once she bought a copy, she might be able to convince him to watch it with her. If he ended up liking it, it could bring them together even closer~!

Ahh~ she was giddy at the thought! She couldn't wait for that to happen!

But she should think about that stuff later when she wasn't busy. Right now, she was on an important romantic date, and she needed to focus on making this the best unforgettable date ever!

Plus, she needed to be on the lookout for her date's cheesy _yawn-stretching-over-shoulder_ move. Once he did it, she'd bounce on the opportunity and catch him off guard by doing something cutesy and romantic in return. He'd never expect it. It'd be perfect!

* * *

 _45 minutes later…_

* * *

" _But Ashton! You have to listen to me! Your client is nothing but a scoundrel and a murderer!"_

" _It doesn't matter what he is, Clementine. I have to get him the Not Guilty verdict, even if costs me my life!"_

" _Damn your sense of pride, Ashton! Why must you risk it all to protect him? Have you no shame? Does owning a perfect winning record matter that much to you, at the cost of your integrity and honesty?"_

 _"You don't get it, Clementine! To hell with my record, and to hell with my pride! None of it matters compared to what I'm truly protecting!"_

" _What do you mean, Ashton?"_

" _Can't you see, Clementine? This case is bigger than us, bigger than anything we can ever imagine. The mafia who my client works for, they've blackmailed me to ensure that I do everything I can to win a non-guilty verdict! I have no choice!"_

" _That's horrible, Ashton! What do they have on you that's gotten you wrapped around their dastardly fingers?"_

" _It's you, Clementine. They've threatened to_ _ **kill**_ _you if I lose this case!"_

 _"Gasp! Ashton, you don't mean… you've been doing this all for me?"_

" _For you, Clementine, I would do anything to protect you. For you see, I am in love with you!"_

 _"Ohh, Ashton!"_

 _ ***Insert incredibly graphic imagery of two adults fervently kissing each other with passion, making romantic grunting noises as they rub their bodies against each other in the most romantic way possible.***_

* * *

What the _fuck_.

This was a terrible movie. This was a dreadful movie. This was a god awful movie.

Who made this? Who wrote this? Who thought this was a good idea?

The people in the movie industry approved of this. They watched this movie and said, "Yes, this is a good movie to make," and actually made it happen to be shown officially in theaters.

Critics were actually praising this garbage? This mess? This unforgivably terrible film?

Why?

WHY?!

 **WHY?!**

* * *

For some reason, Ruby just wanted to puke. Like, she was completely nauseous to the bone.

Everything about this movie made her sick.

The pacing, the writing, the actors' over dramatic non-ironic performances… Oh god-

She held her mouth shut as she lurched forward, fending off the bile that had been threatening to escape ever since this movie started.

Out of all the romantic movies they could have watched, why did they have to end up with **this?!**

The crowd around them were actually enjoying this?! All the women in this theater were crying tears of joy as if they were actually touched by this terrible film!

Ruby wanted to cry herself, but definitely not because the movie was any good!

This movie was lame! Adults were lame! Romances were lame!

* * *

At the part where the main guy, Ashton, pinned Clementine against the wall as he started licking her neck, Yang questioned how this movie managed to get away with just a PG-13 rating. Then when the girl started tearing Ashton's shirt off, Yang really wondered how the hell they managed to get this to be in theaters at all. Like, this could be considered soft-core porn at this point.

Seeing as how this was supposedly based on a book that was written by an author who had also written the smut that Blake happened to like, that probably made sense...

"Hey, Blake. This whole entire scene, was it really in the book?" She whispered.

But when she turned to her, she found Blake to be completely enraptured by the… erm… "action."

Blake then started to mouth along with the cheesy dialogue in the movie.

 _"Once this is over, I promise to take you far away from this place and protect you like a knight to his princess!"_

" _And I shall love you forever in return! May we both live a harmonious life, just us two together!"_

Blake even managed to shed a tear mid-sentence.

"Guess that answers that question…"

Sheesh, that girl got way too into this. It was honestly creepy.

And then Ashton vigorously humped Clementine against the wall while she was moaning like a banshee, and Yang felt compelled to go down to where Ruby was sitting and sock her date in the damn face.

If that Wolf-guy was into this sort of thing, then Yang would have to put a personal stop to this relationship as quickly as possible before he tried anything to corrupt her sister.

"I don't get it," Weiss whispered to her, "Why is the woman allowing this man to smother her against the wall? She's clearly howling in pain. Shouldn't they stop before both of them get hurt?"

Yang stared incredulously at the oblivious heiress, before sighing heavily for the umpteenth time that day.

* * *

During the part where the two main characters took their clothes off and did the horizontal polka, fully uncensored by the way, things started to get really uncomfortable.

I had no idea if I could handle another minute of this. I felt like I could claw my eyes out at any moment.

Actually, no, screw it. Screw this dumb movie. Screw this dumb movie and the people who made it. Not only was I ripped off for buying tickets to this movie, I was now scarred for life and completely traumatized for subjecting myself with this torture device.

Before I could even stand up however, Ruby already beat me to the punch by leaping out of her seat, "I need to use the restroom!"

"Good idea, I'll come with!" I agreed wholeheartedly, praising whatever being out there granted me an escape from this hellhole.

We promptly got out of dodge before this horrible movie could damage our minds any further.

* * *

As Yang noticed Ruby and her date sprinting out of the theater, she quickly grabbed the team's attention by shaking their shoulders, "Guys! Ruby and Wolf-boy just bailed on the movie!"

Thank goodness, too. She didn't think she could last another minute.

"What?! But why though?!" Blake asked in genuine shock, "It's still halfway through the movie! They never got to find out how Ashton was able to make it out with Clementine safely from the mafia!"

"Personally, I find this film to be rather confusing. I can't blame them for wanting to leave midway." Weiss shrugged, getting out of her seat to chase after the lovebirds.

Yang followed after her, only pausing to find Blake still stuck in her seat with her eyes glued to the screen. "Blake! Come on!" She waved.

With visible difficulty, Blake glanced at Yang and back to the screen, before surrendering herself to the power of smut, "You have to go on without me! I can't afford to miss a single second of this!"

The blonde annoyedly rolled her eyes before catching up with Weiss.

Weiss looked back and saw only Yang on her trail. "Where the hell is Blake?"

"Panther has gone AWOL. We're gonna be on our own until that dumb movie is finished."

"Right. Of course. How could I have expected anything else?" She snarked.

* * *

I was awkwardly whistling a random tune while waiting for Ruby outside the restroom stalls. It had been a few minutes now, and she still hadn't finished throwing up yet.

After about the fifth upchuck I heard from Ruby, I safely concluded that I had managed to ruin the entire date with her. Again.

Sigh…

Was this just how it was going to be for the rest of time? Were all of my attempts to take Ruby out on dates going to end up terribly like this? Was I just bad at dating in general?

This was probably a sign or a bad omen or something. I felt like every time I wanted to do something romantic with Ruby, I either got her depressed, horrified, or puking her guts out in disgust.

Was… Was asking her out a mistake? Was this my fault?

 _Maybe… Maybe I should… call this whole thing off before I somehow make it worse and strain our relationship-_

My train of thought was interrupted when Ruby exited the restroom and greeted me with an uncomfortable smile. Rubbing her mouth clean of any vomit, she said, "Okay… I think I feel better now."

"Are you sure? Do you need me to get you some water or some painkillers?" I asked, still slightly worried she might have gotten sick.

But she shook her head, joking, "Naaah, I'm all good. Probably scarred for life, but that usually happens more often than not anyways. No worries."

"Oh. Okay. Good." I scratched my neck awkwardly.

Ruby stood silent as she thought over what to say next.

"..."

"..."

"Sooo…" She began, "That was a terrible movie."

"Heh, yeah." I humorlessly chuckled.

She gave a weak chuckle back.

"..."

"..."

I looked away, embarrassed. "Hey, Ruby, I'm sorry for putting you through all this. I should have made sure the movie was appropriate for us instead of just picking a random one off the Holonet-"

"No! Nonono-" She frantically waved her hands, "It's fine! I'm not mad at you or anything! There was no way you could have known it would end up like that!"

"Yeah. Just like there was no way I could have known that Circus Carnival would end up the way it did either." I muttered bitterly to myself.

Ruby frowned at that, before rubbing her arm with a pitying look.

I just didn't know when to shut my mouth, did I?

Welp, this date was a bust. Again. I should probably end it now and save both of us the shame and trouble we went through for today…

"I can... take you home now, if you want…" I offered.

"Wha- Already?" Ruby looked up with alarm.

"Yeah… I mean, I can't imagine you wanting to drag this out any longer than it-"

"NO!" She suddenly shouted, before grabbing me by the hands and pleading, "I'm fine! Really! I don't care about that! I'm still having fun with you! Promise!"

"..." I couldn't help but stare at her.

I was stunned, honestly. After all that, and she still wanted to keep this date going? I couldn't help but wonder if she was doing this just for my sake… putting herself through this so it could help me feel better.

I ended up giving her another humorless chuckle, "Geez, you don't have to force yourself to put up with me, you know."

Ruby started to worriedly look around, almost as if she was looking for any excuse to stop this conversation from continuing at all cost. Then she saw something behind me and her eyes flashed with an idea.

"You feel sorry about this, right?" She asked with a wide smile.

I blinked, before muttering, "Y-Yeah. I mean, it _was_ sort of-"

"Then you can make it up to me, right here and now! The day isn't over yet! We can still turn this date around!"

"We… We can?"

"Okay…" She blushed as she bowed her head, "So… there was a movie that I wanted to watch when we got here. I didn't want to say anything because we already made plans to watch the Attorney at Dawn thing. I mean- you already bought the tickets anyway, and it would have been unfair to ask you to change your mind and buy tickets to a different movie. But now that we know that the attorney movie is literally trash, it wouldn't hurt to try again by watching something else! What do you say?"

"Oh…heh, I think I get it." I gave a relieved laugh, "Alright then, Ruby. As an apology for horribly subjecting you to watch _Attorney's Vomit: Trials of Bleugh_ , I'll buy tickets to any movie you want to see tonight."

"Yes!" She cheered. Then, after a moment of silence, she told me, "Okay… This might be weird, so don't laugh."

I raised an incredulous eyebrow, "Heh, alright. I mean, I just promised to buy tickets to any movie you want, so you don't have to worry about that."

She took a deep breath…

"I... w-wanted to see the new... _Sailor Sentai Hunters: North Star's Fist_." She mumbled, embarrassed.

I stared at her.

I stared at her for the longest time.

* * *

"They're just standing there. Doing nothing." Weiss commented.

"Huh…" Yang peeked out from her pole, watching the Wolf-guy mindlessly stare at Ruby like a zombie. "Are they staring into each other's eyes romantically?"

"I might've assumed that, but as you can clearly see," the snow-princess pointed at the squirming Ruby, "she's the only one of the two that's growing increasingly uncomfortable as each second passes."

"Right."

Ruby seemed to be getting worried after her date hadn't responded for a long while.

"Any idea why he's acting… creepy towards her?" Yang asked her closet-gamer teammate.

"Don't ask me! How the hell should I know?"

Ruby rubbed her neck awkwardly, "I can… Um… choose a different movie if you want-"

Out of nowhere, the dude suddenly grabbed the little scythe-wielder by the head and leaned closer towards her, "Ruby Rose, I swear to god, it's like you were meant for me!"

"Huh?" She began blushing profusely.

Then he grabbed her hand, before rushing her out to the ticket booth, "Come on! I'll get two tickets pronto! We still have a few minutes left before it starts! If we're quick, I'll even buy another large basket of popcorn to make up for the one you just threw up!"

"Huh?" She replied, still dazed from his impromptu confession.

With an insanely ecstatic jump, he shouted, "WOO! LET'S GO SAILOR SENTAI HUNTERS AHOY!"

Weiss looked over at Yang with a confused glance, "What just happened?"

Yang shrugged cluelessly. "I, uh... I guess they're going to go watch that Sentai thing."

* * *

" _We have to face it, Captain Red! They're just too powerful!" Sailor Scout Yellow shouted, still struggling to stand from the strain of exhaustion. "It's over for us! We can't fight back against a platoon that large! We can't use our powers without our Sailor-Compasses! We can't even find Sailor Doctor Pink ever since we got separated! It's impossible to win!"_

" _No! I refuse to accept that!" Sailor Captain Red shouted back, defiantly pushing himself to his knees despite the damage he sustained in this world-wide scaled battle. "I won't ever give up on this planet! The Zangac Alien Empire can't have this beautiful world!"_

" _You're crazy, Captain! Crazy!" Yellow emphasized, having already lost hope for this world's freedom._

" _Crazy?" The captain looked behind him to glare at his teammate, "You think I'm crazy? I understand that the Empire's platoon overshadows Remnant's entire population! I understand that I have no chance against them by myself! I understand that I might die! But if not me, then who else will defend this planet?! Who else will take my place?!"_

" _Captain…" Yellow whispered breathlessly, taken by surprise at her leader's boundless determination._

" _This Alien Empire might be the strongest foe we ever faced. In fact, they might be the strongest force in the entire universe! But I have something that they'll never be able to acquire, no matter how much power or wealth they gain!"_

 _With a heave, he finally managed to push himself to a standing position, much to Yellow's shock._

" _What I have are my friends! They are the reason I push myself to my absolute limit! They are the reason why I always look forward to the future! No matter how tough, no matter how bleak, as long as I draw breath, I will never stop fighting to protect them!" He screamed to the heavens, before placing a hand to his heart, "That is why I must keep fighting! That is why I must believe that I can win! As long as I have the people I care for… as long as I have my friends by my side… nothing is impossible!"_

 _Almost as if the universe itself was touched after hearing his moving speech, the air around them started picking up speed into a blurring wind. Energy particles from across the galaxy centered around the Captain, before his entire body emitted a blindingly bright red glow!_

 _And then the transformation sequence began as the scene started playing the epic theme song!_

" _SAILOR CAPTAIN RED_ _!_ _ **AHOY!**_ _"_

* * *

"YEEEEEEEEEESSS!" I screamed, exuberating pure unadulterated hype from my very pores as I jumped out of my seat and cheered.

"AAAAAH! I KNEW IT! I KNEW IT WASN'T OVER YET!" Ruby began cheering alongside me, pumping her fists into the air.

We sang along to the lyrics as Sailor Captain Red transformed into his Sentai suit, bouncing from side-to-side with endless energy.

" _LET'S GO LET'S GO Sailors! (AHOY_ _!)  
_ _LET'S GO LET'S GO Sailors! (AHOY!)  
_ _Come take the helm, Defenders of the sea!  
_ _You're champions of the Uni-verse and Justiiice!"_

Luckily for us, we were the only ones in the theater besides an elderly couple in the far back row and two girls with bright hair watching us from the middle row. It was the last day until the movie stopped showing in theaters, so the room wasn't populated with viewers since all the hardcore fans had already watched it within the first week of its premiere. All that was left were some random stragglers and us two geeks who happened to catch the film at the very last minute.

The elderly couple in the back looked content for the most part, while the girls in the middle row were too busy talking to each other to pay any attention to the both of us. Despite our incredibly obnoxious fangasming, nobody else in the theater was really all that bothered.

After Sailor Captain Red finished changing into his Sentai suit, we hurried back to our seats and mindlessly devoured our popcorn.

" _You…you transformed without a Sailor-Compass… How did you do that?"_ Yellow asked in complete awe at her Captain.

Captain Red steadily walked over to Yellow's exhausted body and crouched down on one knee before giving her his hand. _"Simple. I believed I could do it. And I believe that you can too. So what do you say, Sailor Scout Yellow? Will you keep fighting by my side, until you can fight no longer?"_

Yellow looked at her Captain's hand in stunned silence, chuckling to herself. _"You are such a show-off."_

But she grabbed onto his hand anyway and allowed the Captain to hoist her to her feet.

" _Maybe we_ can _win this fight. We'll never know unless we try."_ Yellow nodded in determination, inspired by her leader's words.

" _That's the spirit!"_ Captain Red nodded back at her proudly, smiling behind his Sentai suit helmet.

With that, she held a hand over her heart, and shouted, _"SAILOR SCOUT YELLOW!_ _ **AHOY!**_ _"_

A flash of yellow light surrounded her before she too had changed into her Sentai suit.

Then, without a word of warning, she wrapped her arms around Captain Red, hugging him firmly.

" _Thank you for inspiring me to not give up. I almost forgot who I was supposed to be."_

The Captain hugged her back, _"No. Thank_ _ **you**_ _for being with me 'til the very end. I'd accomplish nothing without you."_

"THEY'RE SO _CUTE_ TOGETHER! AAAH!" Ruby shrieked in joy over the sight of her two favorite characters hugging each other.

"SCOUTxCAPTAIN OTP!" I screamed, cupping my hands around my mouth and nearly spilling our popcorn. "COME ON, TOEI! MAKE IT CANON ALREADY! STOP TEASING THE FANS!"

"WOOOO!"

" _Now…"_ The two Hunters stopped hugging, and Captain Red began to walk towards the Alien Lord Emperor's Ship, _"Let's rescue our team, find Sailor Doctor Pink, and save this entire world from the Zangac Alien Empire Invaders!"_

" _Aye aye, Captain!"_ Sailor Scout Yellow saluted.

* * *

"These two are completely enraptured by this movie. It's honestly creepy…" Weiss shivered, almost disgusted at the sight of these two teenagers obsessing so much over what was basically a kid's film.

"Aw man, watching this movie brings back so much nostalgia." Yang recounted, happily humming to herself as she rediscovered long lost memories. "I remember when our whole family used to have these late night sessions where all we did was watch all the Sentai Rangers for hours. Ruby and I would get so into it, we'd laugh and scream when something exciting happened and we would cry whenever one of our favorite Rangers would get replaced by a new one since we were already attached to the old actor. Our parents might even get swept up in the drama and join in with us too! Dad would always complain about how overpowered the new villain was, and Mom would start singing the theme song of the whatever Sentai series we were watching at that moment! Haha! Ho, this is so much fun!"

Weiss looked over at Yang with a leer, "Your family is weird."

"Yeah…"

"...I wish my family could be like that too, sometimes…" She sighed depressedly to herself.

" _No! That's impossible! How could I have been defeated by a mere group of sailors?!"_ The Overgrown Alien Crab thingy cried out in complete shock.

Without even giving it a chance to recover, the five costumed heroes dramatically summoned a giant toy cannon as the background began flashing a rainbow of colors.

Crossing their plastic cutlass toys together over the ignition rod, just before they ignited the cannon, both Ruby and her date stood up and shouted in unison alongside the five costumed heroes, _**"SUPER. CANNON. BEAM!"**_

Then they sparked the cannon to ignite, and a giant rainbow beam poured out and blasted the alien leader straight in the face.

" _NOOOOO!"_

And then the whole entire alien ship exploded, as well as the thousands of other tinier ships along with it. Somehow.

How this mindless sense of violence and explosions could appeal to anyone in Remnant, Weiss just couldn't understand at all.

But it apparently had the ability to bring families together and get both children and adults excited, so… there was probably something about it that she was entirely missing the point of.

 _Eh. Whatever._ Weiss shrugged.

* * *

After the movie concluded, the two hyperactive teenagers charged out of the theater's doors while dramatically posing random combat stances and singing that damn Sailor Sentai Hunter theme song for the fiftieth time that day.

" _LET'S GO LET'S GO Sailors! (AHOY!)  
_ _LET'S GO LET'S GO Sailors! (AHOY!)  
_ _Come take the helm, Defenders of the sea!  
_ _You're champions of the Uni-verse and Justiiice!"_

The first three times they did that, it was sort of adorable. The few times after that, less adorable. After singing it more than twenty times, it was getting creepy.

Now it was just annoying, and Weiss wanted to desperately shove the both of them down a trash compactor. No, she wanted to throw herself in a trash compactor. No, actually, she wanted to throw herself in a trash compactor while also taking the two idiots with her. Then she could finally die peacefully with her last moments being the sound of all their heads getting crushed to paste instead of that _damn theme song which_ _ **THEY WERE NOW SINGING AGAIN FOR THE MILLIONTH TIME- IT WASN'T THAT GOOD, PEOPLE, CALM DOWN ALREADY.**_

Just before Weiss could snap, Yang grabbed her shoulder from behind and asked, "Hey, shouldn't we probably find Blake before continuing?"

"Yes, good idea," Weiss gave a relieved sigh, "Let's find Blake while the two idiots get that energy out of their systems. If I have to hear them sing that dumb song one more time, I swear I am going to kill someone."

Thankfully, the search for Blake wasn't as difficult and time-consuming as the last time she went missing, after the team discovered she used to be a part of the White Fang. They managed to find her in the lobby, surrounded by a group of like-minded movie-goers who were actively listening to her as she explained how brilliant and faithful the film adaptation was to her stupid smut novel.

Wiping away a stream of tears, she sobbed, "And then when Damian turned himself in to the police in order to protect Clementine, and the scene that played shows him giving her a sad nod as he was driven away- _***Sniff***_ It rekindled the feeling I felt when I first saw that exact heartbreaking scene in the book!"

"He was truly a noble soul, sacrificing his life and freedom just to give the woman he loved his entire life the chance to be happy with another man…" One of the random women in the group recounted, blowing her nose loudly.

"Too pure for this world! He was too pure!"

"We should form a group later, and go visit him together just to let him know how much we appreciate everything he's done for Clementine and Ashton!" One of them suggested.

The group nodded and murmured their agreements to the idea.

At that point, Weiss whispered to Yang, "These people know they're talking about fictional characters, right?"

"Yeah, I don't care." Yang bluntly replied, before walking up to Blake to snap her out of her episode. "Hey. You. Mission. Ruby. Follow. Now." She reminded.

Blake perked up after seeing Yang and remembered what she was originally here for. Wiping her eyes dry of tears, she explained to the group, "Listen, I gotta go do something important. It's been fun talking to everyone, let's all see each other again soon on TwiddlrBook and have more discussions about the Attorney at Dawn book!"

" **Bye ShurikenCupid37!"** The group collectively waved goodbye to Blake as she walked away.

With the three members of Team WBY reunited, they set off once again on their mission to stalk their team leader on her date.

As they left the theater, Weiss gave a dry look to her feline teammate, "Shuriken Cupid Thirty Seven?"

"Oh, that? That's just a pen name. Don't worry about it." Blake awkwardly coughed as she waved the subject away. Resuming her aloof and stoic persona, she asked, "So where did Ruby head off to next?"

"The GPS locator should tell us where she is right now. Give me a second to pull it out." Yang fumbled around in her pockets, pulling out her Scroll.

"I hope this date of theirs is going to finish up soon." Weiss sighed tiredly, "I'm starting to feel exhausted, and the sun is nearly about to set. Regardless of Ruby's love life, don't forget that we still have to go to classes like usual tomorrow morning."

"Right, I nearly forgot about that." Blake nodded, "Weiss, think you can let me borrow your calculus notes? I haven't gotten around to understanding the Mean Value Theorem yet."

"Sure, as soon as we get back to our dorms." Weiss stretched her arms before facing Yang, "So? Did you find out where Ruby is yet?"

But Yang didn't respond. In fact, she was looking at her Scroll with completely dead, emotionless eyes.

Blake raised an eyebrow at this behavior, craning her head over Yang's shoulder to look at her Scroll.

"It's out of batteries." Blake stated.

…

…

…

Weiss curled up into a ball and rolled away, searching for a nearby trash compactor to kill herself with.

"No Weiss, come back! I still need your calculus notes!"

* * *

An entire day passed by peacefully. The sun was starting to set and the sky was glowing a warm beautiful orange.

Two teenagers out on a date decided that, after such a long fun day, they deserved a bit of relaxing. So, they went to the park, just like they planned they would earlier that day, and comfortably sat down on one of the benches in order to admire the calm scenery.

"Hehehe," Ruby started giggling to herself.

I turned to look at her curiously, "What's so funny?"

"Oh, nothing." She smiled, "I just can't believe that you happened to be into the Sentai franchise just like me. It's incredible how everything worked out the way it did."

I smiled back, "I know, right? What are the odds that the both of us just so happened to be obsessed fans of the same exact franchise? It's almost more than a coincidence at this point."

"Heh, yeah. It's almost like it was fate."

I felt myself blushing at that, having no idea what to say in response.

Ruby didn't notice, preferring to stare blissfully at her reflection in the pond.

"Hey, Scooper Boy?" She called.

"Yeah?"

"I just remembered something important."

"And what would that be, Ruby?"

"You never cuddled up to me during either of the movies we watched today."

I blanched, completely forgetting about my romantic plans of being romantically romantic. I was so swept up with everything that happened, it never even crossed my mind.

"I… um… never found the perfect opportunity to… er… pull it off." I mumbled.

"Liar. You totally forgot." Ruby in a matter-of-fact tone.

"Okay, yeah. I did. I'm sorry." I finally admitted.

Ruby giggled again, leaning back in her seat, "Well… The day isn't over yet. It's still not too late, you know?"

Oh really?

With a playful smile, I scooched up right next to her, gave a very unconvincingly dramatic yawn, and swung my arm over her shoulder.

What I didn't expect was Ruby leaning over to kiss me on the cheek before snugly wrapping her arms around my stomach. In fact, it was so unexpected, I almost yelped and flinched at the sudden touch.

Ruby laughed at my reaction, "Caught you by surprise again."

"You can never let me have my moment, can you?"

"Nnno _pe_." She did her signature pop for emphasis, lovingly rubbing her cheek against my chest.

So we stayed like that for a while, wrapped in each other's arms as we waited for the sun to set and for the day to end.

This moment felt… just right. It was almost like I could sit here with her forever, and not have to worry about any of my problems.

The only thing that existed at the moment was the two of us. Together.

All the superficial stuff, like me being a Faunus or her being a human, none of it mattered. We were just a boy and a girl, out on a romantic date, without a worry in the world.

I closed my eyes and relished the feeling, hoping it would last as long as possible.

This was… perfect.

Ruby.

Ruby Rose.

How the heck did you do this to me?

When we first met, you were a random Huntress with a giant scythe that killed an Alpha Beowolf so easily, I nearly crapped my pants and ran away in fright. You chased me down because I was a part of the White Fang. Then you saved my life just as I was about to fall to my death on the side of a cliff, and I saved yours at the same time.

After that, you decided to let me go on a whim simply because you believed that I wasn't a bad person. I never thought I would see you again after you left, and so I went about my life like nothing happened.

But somehow, someway, you found your way back into my life again, showing up out of nowhere as a customer in the ice cream shop I happened to work at.

Giving you some free ice cream as repayment for saving my life and not arresting me, you saw something in me that made you want to keep visiting in order to become my friend. Maybe you thought I was lonely, or maybe you wanted to convince me to leave the White Fang to keep me out of trouble. Whatever the reason, you stayed with me for months, visiting me every Sunday when you had the chance.

Slowly, I warmed up to you and began to trust you. Then we started to bond even closer than before. Even though you knew I was White Fang, even though I knew you were a Huntress, we still trusted each other and got along just fine.

I confided everything to you, as you did with me. We were more than just friends at that point, it was almost like we were illicit partners in crime, keeping each other safe like a secret within our respective affiliations.

Yet over time, our bond grew even stronger as you kept visiting me.

Somewhere down the line, I realized that I had a crush on you. I couldn't get your image out of my head, and I would end up staying awake for entire nights just from constantly thinking about you.

I couldn't handle it anymore and asked you out on a date.

Lo and behold, you actually said yes.

So here I was, going out on a date with the smartest and cutest prodigy the world has ever seen. We liked the same things, we laughed at the same jokes, we teased each other over the silliest things…

Even when I would screw things up and almost spoil the day, either by getting you depressed, making you worry about me, ruining both of our dates because I was a terrible date planner- you still stuck to me like glue and reassured me that you were happy despite everything that happened.

Besides Cambridge Mint, you were the only person I've ever known that I've considered an equal.

No…

You were above me. You were so far above me in so many ways. But you always tried your best to grab me by the hand and pull me up to your level just so we can see eye-to-eye.

There was nobody else in this world that I knew who would do this for me. Not a single human, not a single Faunus, not a single living being. Not even my closest friends, not even my family. Only you.

Only you.

Just you.

"I think I'm in love with you." I spoke out loud without even thinking.

I felt Ruby tense up in surprise.

Slowly, she pulled herself away in order to look up at me with wide eyes, staring at me in a disarray of emotions.

"W-What did you say?" She stammered.

"Okay, so that was probably random and tactless of me." I realized, covering my face with my free hand out of embarrassment, "God dammit, what the hell was I thinking?! I just blurted that out of nowhere without any context or buildup beforehand! Is there something wrong with me?!"

"Did you just say that you were in love with me?" She asked, completely taken off guard.

I sighed, knowing it was already too late to take back my word now that I'd said it. "Yeah. I did say that, didn't I? Sorry if that came out of nowhere and freaked you out."

"No, it's fine! I mean…" She paused, looking down to avoid eye contact. She bashfully started tugging on her skirt, quietly asking, "Did you mean it? When you said that you were in lo with me?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I think I did." I nodded. "I just said it out loud without even thinking, so yeah. I meant it."

"Oh… that's… that's great!" Ruby started to chuckle. Then it slowly morphed into an uncontrollable laugh. "Wow… I mean, WOW. Heheheheheh! You're in love with me. Me! This has never happened to me before. I'm… I'm kind of in shock right now! Heheheheheheheh!" She was glowing absolutely tomato red. The heat of her blush was warm enough that I could even feel it inches away from in front of her face.

I was at a complete loss for words. I didn't realize I had so much sway over her that I could cause her to become a sputtering giggling mess just from a single sentence.

"I-I don't know what to say! Hehehehehehehe- I never thought I would hear you say that so soon! I mean, I was hoping you would say something like that in, like, a year or two into our relationship, assuming I managed to keep it going that long without messing it up like I thought I would. But you honestly feel this way with me?"

"I meant it. Every word. I swear."

If it was even possible, Ruby started giggling even more hysterically once I said that. "Oh- Oh my gosh… Hehehehehehe- I feel light-headed for some reason!" After a moment or so, she finally controlled herself and simmered down considerably. Then she asked me, "Are you absolutely sure?"

"I can say it again if you want me to."

She thought about it briefly, before nodding excitedly at the suggestion.

I couldn't help but chuckle at her cute, flustered reactions. I had never seen this giggly crazy side of her before, it was almost alien. Yet, it was still so naturally Ruby of her to act like this over something as simple as me admitting that I was in love with her.

Yeah, I just used her name as an adjective to describe her. That was how Ruby she was acting right now.

So obviously, I said it again just to see how she reacted. "I'm in love with you."

She began to giggle even harder this time, giving such an embarrassed smile that I couldn't help but admire it.

It was so strange. Now that I'd admitted how I felt about her… I didn't feel nervous around her anymore. There was no sense of awkwardness or hesitance that I usually had when I was around her. Like a chain that had been wrapped around me for too long had finally been unlocked. Now that I knew she almost certainly felt the same way about me, I felt like nothing could hold me back anymore. It was exhilarating. It was gratifying.

In fact, I was going to take advantage of this while I still could, on the off chance that this was only a one-time thing that'd disappear once our date was over and everything went back to normal tomorrow.

"Can I kiss you, Ruby?"

She stopped giggling.

I stopped smiling.

The nervousness and hesitancy that I usually felt was back in full force, much sooner than I was expecting. Maybe I should have thought this through before opening my mouth and asking stupid questions.

"Um…that is…erm… only if you want to…?" I stuttered, trying my best to regain the lost confidence I had just a moment before. Come on man, it was right here! Where did it go?! Right when I needed it most!

"Kiss like, a quick kiss? Or kiss like, kissing? Boyfriend and girlfriend kissing?" She asked timidly.

"The…the second one. That one. Yeah." I explained lamely.

Ruby blinked a few times, glancing away and then glancing back. Without uttering another word, she nodded.

The two of us probably looked like a pair of cherries from how red our faces were.

With my heart beating in my ears, I slowly leaned in towards Ruby and lowered my eyelids.

Ruby leaned in as well, closing her eyes while gripping tightly on the front of my hoodie, to the point where her knuckles were white as bedsheets.

This was going to be my first kiss with her. My first ever kiss with anyone, actually. Depending on what happens next, this was either going to suck majorly and ruin the tension…

Or this was going to be the crowning moment of my entire life.

Either way, might as well make the most of it.

I closed my eyes and leaned forward.

* * *

"I can't believe you let your Scroll run out of batteries." Weiss facepalmed.

Yang ignored the Ice-Queen, stabbing a fork in her fries as she waited for the Scroll to finish charging up.

Team WBY was currently sitting at a table inside a local diner, allowing themselves to have a quick dinner break before they accidentally drove each other insane.

Apparently, it turned out that the damn GPS tracking app Yang installed had actually been extremely draining on her Scroll's resources. Even though she had a full charge just this morning, keeping the app activated constantly throughout the day ate through her batteries faster than Ruby finishing a jar of chocolate chip cookies.

Since they didn't immediately follow Ruby after she left the movie theaters, they'd completely lost her trail. The only way to find out where she was now, besides splitting up and scouring the whole entire city, was waiting on the Scroll to finally get enough charge to turn back on again.

So yeah. Diner.

Yang absentmindedly chewed on her fries, not bothering to dip it in the ketchup that she ordered with them.

Weiss was impatiently drumming her fingers on the table, sipping on her plastic cup of sweet tea.

Blake was engorging herself with some kind of fish sandwich thing that she ordered. Yeah, I dunno, Yang wasn't paying attention.

"You guys should try out this place's sandwich. This thing is delicious!" Blake spoke up with her mouth full. When neither of her two teammates responded, Blake shrugged and kept chowing down without a care.

"Okay, I've got an idea!" Weiss proclaimed, "How about, instead of waiting, you give me the chip you used so that I can install the app to find Ruby on my Scroll! Then we would find out exactly where the dweeb went, and we wouldn't have to wait any longer in this stupid filthy backwater diner - no offense to the owner, by the way!" She waved at the gruffy old man with the manager's badge on his outfit.

"Eh." He grunted in return.

"That would be a great idea," Yang said with a bitter tone, "Except for the fact that this stupid GPS chip won't work on new devices until you sync it up with the object it's supposed to be tracking. And since Ruby currently has the hairclip we need to sync it with, and we also can't seem to find Ruby at the moment - Well, you get the idea."

"Ugh, figures." Weiss slammed her head on the table. "Why can't our missions ever go as planned? There always has to be some complications in the way." Raising her fingers, she listed off, "Codename miscommunication. The random arcade idiot that nearly attacked Ruby. Blake abandoning the mission to go watch - ACTUALLY, NOW THAT I THINK ABOUT IT-"

Pointing an accusatory finger at Blake, Weiss began to shout, "This is all your fault!"

Blake's cat ears flickered as she paused mid-chew, turning to Weiss in confusion. "Uh… What?"

"The only reason why we stopped following Ruby was because we had to go back to get you! If you hadn't gone AWOL in the middle of the mission to keep watching that stupid smut movie of yours, we would still be in the middle of stalking Ruby on her first date right now!"

After a second or two, Blake swallowed her meal and gave a sheepish smile, "Sorry?"

"..."

"..."

The fire in Weiss's eyes suddenly died and she leaned back in her chair with a tired expression. "Whatever. I can't even bring myself to get angry right now."

Blake blinked at Weiss's deflated attitude, before quietly resuming her meal.

And then there was awkward silence.

The three girls looked at one another in thought, before collectively asking themselves the same exact question.

" **I wonder what Ruby is up to right now** **?"**

* * *

Ruby leaned back and opened her eyes, hovering her fingers over her lips in shock.

"That was my first kiss…" She said breathlessly.

"Mine too." Her date smiled, staring into her eyes.

Ruby smiled back before burying her face in his chest in a desperate attempt to stop from making a complete doofus out of herself. But just like before, she couldn't calm herself down as her uncontrollable giddy excitement completely overwhelmed her. She couldn't stop laughing to herself, her crazy giggling reverberating through his entire body like a broken subwoofer.

Could you blame her, though? The boy she was dating just confessed that he was in love with her, and traded his first kiss for hers! This was pretty much one of the greatest days of her life!

Turning her head up, she said out loud to herself with a surprised tone, "You're my boyfriend."

"Yeah." He whispered in response.

Almost as if she was unable to believe it herself, she repeated once again with emphasis, "You're _**my**_ boyfriend."

"I'm your boyfriend." He confirmed, reassuring her that everything was real.

"You're all mine." She stated.

"Every single inch of me. All of it." He declared.

"Say that you're in love with me." She commanded.

"I'm in love with you."

"Say it again."

"I'm in love with you."

"One more time for good measure."

"I'm in love with you."

Ruby couldn't help it anymore.

She grabbed the back of his head and forced him to kiss her again.

* * *

"See you again same time, next week?" I asked Ruby.

"Like clockwork!" Ruby answered cheerfully, steadily inching herself towards the Bullhead behind her.

"Same place as usual?"

"You know it!"

Reaching the inside of the Bullhead, the air vehicle's engine started to flare up before the ramp between the two of us was slowly raised.

Cupping her hands, Ruby shouted above the noise of the Bullhead's engine, "Don't forget to text and call me whenever you feel lonely!"

Waving my hand farewell, I shouted back, "I love you, Ruby!"

"I love you toooooo!"

With that, the Bullhead closed its entrances before rising up into the air and taking off towards Beacon Academy.

The Bullhead out of sight, I turned around with a happy hum and headed back home.

Occasionally, I did a hop, a skip, and a jump, clicking my heels together each time with the memory of Ruby's kiss in the forefront of my mind.

Today was a good day. Today was a really good day.

Softly, I began to sing to myself,

" _Let's go, let's go, Sailors,  
_ _Let's go, let's go, Sailors,  
_ _Come take the helm, Defenders of the sea,  
_ _You're champions of the Uni-verse and Justiiice…"_

* * *

Jaune Arc of team JNPR yawned ferociously after a long day of training with his partner. His body incredibly tired from the long, arduous training session, he wanted nothing more than to hit the sack as early as possible.

But on his way to his dorm room, he took in the curious sight of Ruby spinning around like a ballerina in the middle of the hallway, donning the goofiest grin he had ever seen in his entire life.

As she drew closer, Jaune's interest was piqued, so he greeted the younger leader, "Hey there, Ruby. You seem like you're in a good mood."

"Oh, hello Jaaaune~!" She sang, coming to a stop in front of her team's dorm room. "I feel absolutely great! Like everything in the world just feels right and nothing could go wrong!"

Jaune chuckled, "Alright, Ruby. Come on, spill the beans. What's gotten you so high on life?"

With a giggle, she asked, "Have you ever met someone who you thought would only be just a friend, before slowly coming to realize that you're in love with them?"

Jaune briefly thought of Weiss for a bit, before his brain caught up with what Ruby just said. With a gasp, he whispered, "No way!"

"Yep!"

"You're in love with someone?!"

"Heehee! Yep!" She tightly wrapped her arms around herself, "And he loves me back!"

"Wait, so, does that mean you're dating someone?!"

"Officially boyfriend and girlfriend!"

"Wow…" Jaune shook his head in disbelief, "I'd never thought I'd see the day that our adorable little cookie monster would finally grow up and started playing the romance game with the rest of us young adults…"

Then he yawned again, reminding himself of how tired he was.

"You should tell me more about this guy later. Right now though, I really need to get some shuteye…" He rubbed his eyes in an attempt to stay awake for just a second longer.

"Oh, yeah, sure!" Ruby waved goodbye, "Good night Jaune! Don't oversleep like last time!"

"You don't have to remind me." He laughed, entering his dorm room and slamming his face on the first soft object he could find.

Ruby continued to giggle to herself as she unlocked her dorm room and walked inside.

Strangely enough, it looked like she was the only one in the room. The rest of her team probably didn't make it back yet from whatever they were doing today.

 _Oh well._

Softly humming the Sailor Sentai Hunter theme song to herself, she took off her hair clip and set it down on her workbench/desk before changing into her pajamas.

* * *

 _ ***Ping!***_

The entire team WBY perked up after hearing Yang's Scroll turn on before they all clamored over each other in an attempt to finally find out where Ruby was located.

As the app began to load, the three girls silently watched the Scroll with visible unrest. The trepidation in the air was palpable enough to make Play-Doh out of it.

Then the app finally loaded, and team WBY stuck their heads in closer to get a good look.

…

"SHE'S ALREADY BACK AT BEACON?!" Yang shouted.

Weiss slammed her head into the table to muffle the sound of her dying screams.

Blake leaned back in her set with a groan, raising her hand up to call the servers, "Check, please! And a box to go!"

Nearly tearing her hair out from frustration, Yang began to cry, "Damn it, I missed the end of Ruby's first date! Now I'll never find out if they kissed or not! _**RRRAAAAAAAAAAAA-**_ "

And so, the end of the day draws near…

* * *

 **Yeah, I still have no idea what the main character's name is. If I can't decide on a name for him soon, I'll just pick a random internet meme and call it a day at that point.**

 **Review, please! Let me know what you thought of this chapter.**

 **Next chapter will be focused on his life as a White Fang grunt, since I realize I haven't shed a spotlight on that yet even though that's literally half the appeal of this fanfiction.**


	6. Jaune Betrays Ruby: Episode 3

Evening.

An old broken down house in the middle of nowhere. Dark, creepy, probably had some rats breeding inside. It was a mystery how it hasn't gotten demolished yet. Place was older than dirt. Funny thing though, the place also happened to have a kickass basement with steel walls and a giant vault door. Whoever owned this pile of junk above must have been some paranoid maniac that expected the end of the world to happen soon.

What a waste to let such good space to rot with an old crappy house.

Which was why the White Fang thought it was the perfect place to turn into one of their hideouts.

A shipment truck slowly drove up to the back, parking right in front of its basement doorway. A lone masked hooded figure got out of the vehicle, cautiously checking their surrounding.

Satisfied that there was nobody following them, they walked up to the basement doorway and raised their hand to knock.

Four knocks.

Two knocks.

Another two knocks.

The masked figure waited for a moment, before stating: "Knack 2 is a bad game."

Instantly, the doorway was unlocked. As it opened, another masked figure appeared, although he was slightly chubbier than the first.

"Another shipment already?" He asked.

The other figure nodded, "The guys at the main headquarters have been working overtime."

"Sheesh, we haven't even finished sorting through our earlier shipment yet! Can't they go easy a bit with all these heists?"

"Blame that Roman Torchwick guy," the figure pointed behind them. "He's been leading and helping us get all this Dust for the past week."

The chubby figure visibly gagged, "Ugh, I hate the fact that we have to work with a _human_. Leaves a sour taste in my mouth."

"I know what you mean, but he's different." His friend offered, "He seems to hate other humans as much as we do. Like, he gets us, you know?"

"Pfeh." He scoffed, "Even if that's true, I still don't want to trust a _human_ to command us what to do. I just get bad vibes from him, like he might have some sort of ulterior motive or something."

"Yeah, well, like it or not, he's here to stay. We're too desperate to turn away help, and he's been doing a great job so far for any of the higher ups to consider dumping him. Despite being a human, the higher ups don't seem to care as long as he does the job."

The masked figure then turned around to walk over to the truck, opening the shipment container. Inside were layers upon layers of boxes that contained Dust of all classes, from the most concentrated of powders to the highly-volatile crystals.

Chubby gaped at the sight. "Woah. That's a lot of Dust."

"Yeah." The masked figure gestured, "So get moving, will ya? The longer this truck stays outside the base, the more likely we'll catch someone's attention."

"R-Right... sure." Chubby faltered, before moving to help carry the shipment inside.

* * *

In the basement of the abandoned house, three hooded figures worked tirelessly as they categorized and organized various forms of Dust before hiding them in disguised cat food boxes.

One was in charge of sorting the crystals, one in charge of sorting the powder, and the last cheerfully boxing it all up with his earbuds on.

The two hooded figures arrived carrying more Dust, setting it down for all to see. "Amber's back with more shipments." The chubby one announced.

Two of the White Fang members already sorting Dust groaned at the sight of more work. "Are you kidding me? We're barely even finished with the work we got earlier this evening!" One of them tore his mask off in frustration, revealing the crow feathers growing out of his head.

"I know, man. I know…" Chubby sighed in sympathy.

"Oh suck it up, you guys." The hooded figure who drove the truck, Amber, chastised as she flung her mask off and let her hair out. Brushing her hands through her hair, two red fox ears popped up out of instinct before she forcefully shoved them flat. "Brick, I'm gonna take a breather, alright?"

The chubby figure, Brick, sighed again before groaning, "Fiiine…" Then he went back up the stairs to bring in more Dust.

"How you doing, Finch?" Amber strolled up to the crow Faunus, casually plopping herself on his work table.

"I am bored out of my freaking mind." The crow stated irritatedly, "If I have to spend another hour doing nothing but pouring red Dust into red tubes and blue Dust into blue tubes, I'm gonna go insane and set fire to this whole damn place."

"Yikes."

"Why do all of us rookies have to get the lamest jobs? I wanna be out there where the actual action is! I wanna go on heists too! I want to prove myself that I'm more capable than this crap!"

"Heh. I honestly can't relate to that at all." Amber smirked, "I'm sort of relieved that all I have to do is drive around town at night, delivering contraband. Can't imagine myself on the front lines."

"At least you get to actually do something more physical and productive than just mindlessly sitting still for several hours." Finch grumbled, opening another unmarked tube and pouring the Dust onto a glass pane before sifting through it.

"Why are you itching for action anyway? You risk getting caught or even getting hurt out in the open like that." Amber asked, "I mean, things don't always go to plan. If something goes wrong, you'd be lucky if all you ended up with was a demotion, like these two here." She gestured to the other figures in the room, "Most Faunus aren't that lucky."

"Yeah, right. Like I'd consider this me being ' _lucky_.'" One of the masked figures retorted, carefully setting different colored Crystal Dusts in organized trays. "Didn't even do anything wrong, but I still got in trouble anyway thanks to that self-righteous prick." He glared at the only other figure in the room.

Too busy filling the cat food boxes while humming to his music, the happy-go-lucky figure barely noticed the attention.

"It's been months since that day, why are you still so hung up about it?" Finch complained, "Plus, you had plenty of chances of getting promoted back to the front lines since then. If you weren't such a negative nancy all the time and kept pissing off our superiors, you'd be long gone by now."

"I don't want to hear that coming from you, _Bird_." He growled, going back to work.

"Jerk still hasn't gotten rid of that stick up his ass…" Finch muttered.

Amber sighed, unsure exactly how to deal with the negative atmosphere in the room. In the end, she decided to go over to visit the only other Faunus that she hadn't spoken too yet. At the very least, he seemed to be the only one in a good mood, and Monty knows how rare that had been lately.

Leaning against a wall, she crossed her arms and greeted, "Hey Young Pup. How's life treating ya?"

The guy didn't seem to notice or hear her at all, still nodding his head obliviously along to the beat of his music as he continued to organize all the Dust.

She chuckled, before talking to Finch, "Young Pup's usually more reserved than this. Any idea what's got him so upbeat?"

"Who the hell cares?" The other masked figure in the room interrupted, "Leave the dumbass alone so that he doesn't start flapping his annoying gums."

Ignoring the Debbie-Downer, Finch paused from his chores to walk over to Amber and lean against the wall next to her, "No idea. He's been like that ever since he clocked in tonight."

"So am I just going to be carrying all these Dust shipments in by myself now?" Brick complained, returning with another box. Setting it down, he noticed one of the stations was unmanned as he saw Finch and Amber gathered near the Wolf Faunus with his headphones on. "What's going on guys? We all taking breaks now?"

Finch gestured towards the happy Faunus, "You have any idea why Wolf-boy is in such a good mood today?"

"Not really. Why? Does it matter, though?" Brick asked, walking over to the group.

Having three people surrounding him, the Wolf Faunus eventually noticed the crowd and took off his headphones, "Hey guys. Welcome back, Amber. Something wrong?"

"So we noticed you've been a bit happy lately, Young Pup." Amber started, "Anything new happened? Anything good?"

"...Young Pup?" Young Pup repeated incredulously, "Is that my new nickname for the day?"

"Why, something wrong with it?" She asked innocently.

"Well, I mean, no…it's just- I have an actual name you can use, you know. It's not even that long or anything. Don't see why you gotta call me something new everyday."

"Yeah, well…" Amber shrugged, "I don't like your actual name."

"That's depressing, but understandable." Wolf-boy nodded with a frown.

"Come on! Stop changing the subject!" Finch tapped the workstation excitedly, "Just a moment ago, you were humming and singing like you won the lottery! Give us the dirt, what's the secret?"

The masked Faunus rubbed his neck, embarrassed, "Have I actually been singing?"

"Eh, you were energetic at least." Brick made a so-so motion.

"It's the first time we've ever seen you so upbeat since you transferred here. You're normally so reserved and serious all the time." Amber explained.

"And me acting upbeat was enough to get you all so curious? Even you, Brick?"

"I like to follow the crowd." Brick stated.

"So? What's the story?!" Finch bounced like a kid on Christmas, "Won a contest? Got a raise? Met a girl?"

At the mention of a girl, Wolf-boy looked away from them as he fiddled with a tube of Dust.

"Girl. It's a girl." Finch deduced, using his SUPER SPECIAL CROW SIGHT VISION TO ANALYZE THE FACE OF HIS QUARRY TO SCIENTIFICALLY IMPOSSIBLE DEGREES. Like Sherlock Holmes, except even more bullshit.

"Ooh! A girl!" Amber chuckled, nudging the flustered boy, "A little bit of romance to spice up your life, eh?"

"Hey! Nice! Congratulations, champ. She must be something special if she's gotten you this happy." Brick gave him a complimentary thumbs up.

"Um…" Wolf-boy stuttered, unable to give a reply.

Amber started asking a series of rapid questions, "So what's she like? Is she cute? Short or tall? What type of girl is she?"

With a lewd gesture, Finch cupped his hands in front of his chest, "Does she have huge honkers?"

"Is she older than you?" Brick asked bluntly. "Because that would be pretty hot."

Flabbergasted with the sudden questions and attention placed on him, Wolf-boy couldn't respond properly to any of them, "I- um- wait- what was- I didn't hear-"

Just then, they all got interrupted by a rather loud slam behind them. They all turned around to look at the only other masked figure in the room, standing up from his workstation with his hands trembling and veins popping from his skull, which was somehow visible despite the mask. It was, like, popping through the mask. It was pretty freaky.

"You idiots are all so goddamn annoying. Since all of you would rather sit around and talk about romance like a bunch of high-school girls instead of doing your jobs, I might as well take my freaking break outside."

The guy roughly tore his mask off and brought his hoodie down, revealing long, brown, floppy dog ears lying behind his head. Violently scratching his them, he stormed up the stairs as he pulled a cigarette from his pocket.

With his rude behavior, he left behind a group of Faunus that felt soured from his belittling words.

Amber sighed, "We were just having a little bit of fun. Is that so wrong?"

"Bah, just ignore him. He's always been like that, especially to our wolf-compatriot here. We wouldn't get along with him even if it saved our lives." Finch waved away with a grumble.

" **HEY, YOU IDIOTS FORGOT TO UNLOAD THE GIANT TRUCK FILLED WITH ILLEGALLY-STOLEN DUST OUT HERE! IF YOU DON'T GET MOVING, WE'RE ALL GONNA GET CAUGHT!"**

"Oh crap!" Brick slapped himself, "Freaking forgot all about that." Then the plushy Faunus hurried out to carry more Dust inside.

"You know, he has a point." Wolf-boy said, putting his headphones back on, "We should get back to work while the night's still young. We talked for long enough."

"Aw, don't be like that, Young Pup! We were just getting to the good part!" Amber groaned, "At least share some more details about her!"

"Yeah! Put an image in our heads!" Finch continued the conversation, even as he returned to his station and went to work, "What does she look like?"

"I dunno guys… I really don't want to mix my personal life with my White Fang job. I want to try to keep the two as separate as possible."

"Come on! What's the harm in telling us what kind of person your girl is like? None of us are going to actively look for her and then try to mug her or anything." Finch laughed, before blinking and stating, "Well, not all of us. Hopefully, Malone's not that type of psychopath."

"Can't you at least tell us what kind of Faunus she is?" Amber asked with a hopeful tone.

At that, Wolf-boy froze up for a brief moment. "F-Faunus?"

"Yeah! Rabbit? Cat? Is she a fox like me, a bird like Finch, or a wolf like you?"

Finch couldn't help but raise an eyebrow as the Wolf Faunus suddenly started stammering nervously, "Um… Right. Faunus. Of course she is. Obviously. What else could she be except a F-Faunus? Haha…"

"Sooo? Which is she?" Amber urged, too curious and nosy to drop the subject.

"Um… Uh…" Wolf-boy began to nervously sweat under his hood, tapping his foot as he tried to concentrate on what should have been a simple question to answer. Then, he blurted out, "Hamster!"

"A hamster?" Amber repeated.

"YES! She's a cute adorable hamster girl that I've had a crush on for a while! You can't tell immediately that she's a hamster because she doesn't have any obvious hamster features! But she has- erm- an extremely small tail! Yes! A small, cute, furry hamster tail! And nothing else! Because she is a hamster! Yes!"

The room was silent as his two White Fang comrades slowly digested the information. Wolf-boy had a nervous smile on, hoping they wouldn't question him any further.

Brick came down with another shipment of Dust, setting it on a nearby table, "Another one down! There's still more though!" He went back up to carry down some more.

Amber seemed to have bought the idea that Wolf-boy's girl-crush was a hamster Faunus, smiling sweetly, "You know, that actually sounds pretty cute. Not a lot of hamster Faunus in Vale, I don't think."

Finch, however, remained silent. Knowing a lie when he heard one, he decided to leave no comment as he understood his comrade's special situation. All he did was give a small nod and went back to work as if nothing had happened.

Brick came back again, setting down another box. With a huff, he asked, "Amber? Done with your break yet? Could use some help, there's a LOTTA Dust in that truck."

"Already?" Amber groaned, "Come on man, can't I catch a break that lasts longer than five minutes?"

"You know what?" Wolf-boy stood up from his seat, "Let me help out, Brick. The faster we finish, the faster we go home for the night."

"Oh, yes, thank god, please!" Brick sighed in relief before going back up again.

Just as Wolf-boy began to leave, Finch rose from his station, "I think I'll help out, too. The more the merrier. Amber, why don't you take a nap or something."

Amber thought about it, before shrugging, "Might as well. Thanks for the save, you two!"

Catching up to the Wolf Faunus, Finch lightly tugged the boy's sleeve. "Hey man, um…"

The boy tensed up from the touch, but did his best to react as normally as possible. "Yeah? What's up, Finch?"

"The girl isn't a hamster Faunus, is she?"

Wolf-boy froze in place, unable to respond.

Finch cleared his throat awkwardly, before explaining, "Hey man, I don't judge. I mean, isn't this what the White Fang was meant to be for? This kind of stuff? Like, you do you, man. Good on ya for finding someone you likes you for who you are."

Slowly turning his head around, Wolf-boy took off his mask to look at Finch face-to-face, "R-really? You don't mind? Even though we're all..."

"I'm not that type of guy. Individuality over group-mentality, man. As long as she makes you happy. I won't tell nobody."

Patting his back comfortably, Finch went ahead in front of the Wolf Faunus, leaving him in the middle of the stairs, looking dazed.

After a while, Wolf-boy gave a small smile, turning on his music player and putting his mask back on.

* * *

Vale. Beacon. Grimm Studies. Same ol' class, same ol' schedule.

It should have been as boring and typical as ever. Professor Port going on and on about his own personal stories while only occasionally mentioning any facts about the Grimm, Weiss being as studious and uptight as usual, Blake secretly reading her story book, Yang taking a nap.

But… for some reason…

Everything just felt much happier today.

Ruby smiled to herself, clueless about Port's dramatic speech as she continued to doodle random squiggles that just so happened to end up looking like hearts. Heheh, how cheesy.

Lost in her own daydream, she had no idea about Port's speech coming to an end.

"And so, exiting the lounge of the bar, inexplicably smelling of cabbages for what seemed like the fifth time so far in my entire life, I dragged the violently-thrashing Griffon by the scruff of its neck out in the open, before slaying the damned creature with my trusty blunderbuss, 'Portmanteau,' and securing peace for the once-again safe village!" He finished with a bow, basking in the nonexistent applause from his audience/students. Wrapping things up, he looked around and asked, "With that story told, can anyone tell me what sort of lessons you might have learned as you listened to the tale of my thrilling adventure?"

There was a proud gleam in his eye when he saw at least a dozen of his students raised their hands to answer, including the ever-perfect and his personal favorite student, Weiss Schnee.

However, next to the young heiress, Port noticed with a frown that said student's partner seemed to be completely lost in her own world. Her eyes were glazed and her smile oblivious, as she drew thoughtlessly on her scrap of paper.

Roughly clearing his throat, he stepped over to Ruby and towered above her, menacingly crossing his arms. "Perhaps someone with a short attention span could hopefully give me a decent answer, hmmmm?"

Despite his large figure casting a shadow over her, she still didn't spare him any of her attention.

Weiss had to nervously, yet firmly, jab an elbow into her team leader to snap her out of it, whispering with a harsh, "Ruby! The professor is talking to you!"

But the young girl didn't seem too worried. No, she didn't seem to understand her dire situation at all! Ruby glanced over at Weiss, before finally noticing Port's presence in front of her. With a pleasant smile, she greeted him with a rather disarming, "Hey, Professor Port!"

 _You'd think the girl would have more situational awareness…_ Port thought to himself.

"Good afternoon to you too, Miss Rose! I say, you wouldn't happen to know what we were discussing in class today, would you?" Port leaned down, sharing an intimidating smile in return, "I hope you weren't too distracted with your drawings to pay any attention!"

"Oh, uh…" Ruby chuckled, embarrassingly rubbing her neck. "I might have, um… tuned out for a few parts. You mentioned something about your cabbage problem again, right?"

Port smiled, "Lucky guess, but not the correct answer." Turning to Weiss, he asked, "Miss Schnee, you raised your hand earlier. What lesson did you learn from my adventurous tale?"

"You were bringing attention to the Griffon's weakness!" Weiss answered dutifully. "Like most creatures, the nerves within their spine can be cut in order to critically paralyze their bodies. Although most Grimm don't follow this rule, with their spine protected by thick hides or a shell of armor, the Griffon happens to be one of the few Grimm species that can have their limbs disabled, specifically their wings! Their most vulnerable spot is the nape, which unfortunately is also the most difficult spot to attack."

"Wonderfully spoken, Miss Schnee!" Port clapped loudly, causing Weiss to do a humble bow before she sat back down. "So, Miss Rose, do you have anything to say for yourself-" He turned to Ruby, only to furrow his brow when he saw her distracted and not listening again.

There she was, mindlessly scribbling in her notes with the same oblivious smile as before.

Port roughly snatched the thing away from her, perusing the contents for himself. Various heart symbols surrounding a surprisingly-decent drawing of a young man's face with wolf ears covered the paper.

"So Miss Rose, care to explain what this is about?" Professor Port pointed at the drawing in a stern tone.

Ruby Rose, still unaware of the Professor's increasingly-irritated mood, began blushing and giggling to herself as she looked away with hands covering her face, "Hehehehe- I want to- but- Hehehehe- I'm really embarrassed to tell!"

And just like that, it all clicked for Port. Ruby's behavior, the boy in the picture- he understood what this meant.

It was just a case of a young maiden's first love blooming in full force. Ah yes, it all made sense for him now. He remembered the good ol' days of his youth when he too was but a boy that had become infatuated with the love of his life. It sparked pleasant memories of their many moments together.

Ahh, dear Agatha. Sweet, sweet, Agatha.

She was a right harlot and a complete wench after the magic was over, but still. Aaahh- dear sweet pre-marriage Agatha.

Not an excuse to mindlessly daydream in his class, though.

"Miss Schnee, I expect you to make sure Ruby Rose completes the extra assignments I'm about to give her after class, as punishment for her behavior."

"Yes, Professor Port, sir." She nodded seriously.

He laid the drawing back on Ruby's desk as she still giggled madly to herself, before going on to continue his class.

* * *

 _ **R = Ruby**_

 _ **BF = Boyfriend**_

 _ **R:**_ _I got assigned extra work today as punishment ;-;_

 _ **BF:**_ _What? What did you do?_

 _ **R:**_ _Daydreaming in class during a lecture… T_T_

 _ **BF:**_ _GG_

 _ **BF:**_ _What were you even daydreaming about?_

 _ **R:**_ _…_

 _ **BF:**_ _…?_

 _ **R:**_ _It's a secret ;P_

 _ **BF:**_ _kek_

 _ **BF:**_ _Let me guess…_

 _ **BF:**_ _Was it about cookies?_

 _ **R:**_ _LOLNO_

 _ **R:**_ _Guess again C:_

 _ **BF:**_ _Next visit to the Mint Factory on Sunday?_

 _ **R:**_ _Maybe…_

 _ **BF:**_ _Next date?_

 _ **R:**_ _…_

 _ **R:**_ _yes_

 _ **BF:**_ _In that case_

 _ **BF:**_ _How about for our next date_

 _ **BF:**_ _You and I go_

 _ **R:**_ _yes_

 _ **BF:**_ _Not done yet :P_

 _ **BF:**_ _go to the next_

 _ **R:**_ _yes_

 _ **BF:**_ _*drumroll*_

 _ **R:**_ _yes_

 _ **BF:**_ _stop_

 _ **R:**_ _NO_

 _ **BF:**_ _To the next Exotic Firearms Show that'll be hosted in Vale's Mound Mall next week?_

 _ **R:**_ _EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE_

 _ **BF:**_ _I can somehow feel your squees from all the way here._

* * *

Eyes glued to her Scroll, Ruby had an excited smile as she rapidly tapped on her screen like a woodpecker in mating season.

The whole collective group of RWBYJNPR looked on in fascination as the the rare species known as "Eatibus-all-the-Cookiesius" had decided on doing something that should have been against its very nature: ignoring her tray of cookies in order to focus on texting a certain boy she knew.

Yang, while sitting next to her, slowly poked Ruby's tray an inch closer to see how she would react. But even when the tray of cookies was literally right under her chin, Ruby barely paid any attention.

"This is so freaky…" Nora whispered to Ren. Ren nodded back, fascinated with the sight.

Ruby suddenly burst out giggling, holding her Scroll close to her chest and rocking side to side with it like she was on cloud nine. After that, she went back to texting with a noticeable blush this time.

Pyrrha leaned over to whisper to Jaune, "You know, I almost didn't believe you at first when you told us that Ruby found herself a boyfriend. I never expected her to be the type."

"I know right? Gah, I don't know why but I actually feel sort of proud of her!" Jaune whispered back with a smile.

Pyrrha chuckled in response, giving her attention back to Ruby.

* * *

 _ **R:**_ _So it's a date? :D_

 _ **BF:**_ _On a calendar and everything._

 _ **R:**_ _I can't wait!_

 _ **R:**_ _I'm gonna eat lunch now, ttyl?_

 _ **BF:**_ _Sure. I'll be up until 12 tonight._

 _ **R:**_ _cool. I luv you 3 3_

 _ **BF:**_ _*gif of Rick Astley's Never Gonna Give You Up*_

* * *

Ruby sighed with a smile, closing her Scroll and pocketing it to return to her lunch, only now noticing all of her friends staring at her like an animal in a zoo exhibit. "Oh, hey guys! I didn't notice anyone sitting down. When did you all get here?"

"We were all sitting here first, before you did…" Blake pointed out.

"Oh." Ruby blinked. Then, without another word, she began feasting on her tray of cookies.

"Sooo… Ruby…" Pyrrha started off, "I hear that you've found yourself a boyfriend."

Pyrrha flinched as Ruby suddenly lurched back and coughed violently. Clearing her cookie-filled throat, she cried, "How did you know about that?!"

"Uh- buh- wha-" Pyrrha stammered, caught off guard from Ruby's shocked reaction, "I- I- J-Jaune told me about it!"

"Jaune! I told you that in secret!" Ruby aimed her distraught and betrayed eyes at Jaune.

Jaune held his hands up in panic, "What?! I didn't know it was supposed to be a secret! You never said it was!"

With an anguished groan, Ruby slammed her head down on her cookie tray, refusing to look up to make eye contact with anyone.

"You weren't exactly hiding it very well, you know." Yang laid her head down next to her little sister's, "Even if you didn't tell Jaune, we all would have figured it out from the way you've been acting all morning."

Ruby moaned in response.

"Why did you want it to be a secret, anyway?" Jaune asked, laying his head down to her level as well. "You didn't want your friends to know that you have a boyfriend?"

"No, it's not that…" Ruby tilted her cookie crumb-covered face up, "I just didn't want Yang to make a big deal out of it."

"Wait, why only me?" Yang asked, but was ignored as Ruby continued.

"This is the first time something like this has ever happened to me. I already know that I'm not exactly a _normal_ girl, so I just didn't want to screw it up. I thought, the less everyone knew about him, the less attention I would get."

"Oh Ruby," Pyrrha sighed in understanding, "You don't have to worry about that! If you don't want us to make a big deal out of it, just say so. We're your friends! Just tell us how you feel and we'll understand."

"Yeah! Besides, you're not the only one in our group that's in a relationship! It's nothing that special!" Jaune reassured her.

"Really? I'm not the only one?" Ruby asked.

"Sure! I mean, just look at-"

Jaune began gesturing towards Ren and Nora, only to be interrupted as they both simultaneously announced, **"We're not dating."**

"Oh. Uhh, then what about Pyrrha? I'm sure she's probably with some cool pro-huntsman back in-"

"Actually, I'm still single. Haven't found a boyfriend yet." Pyrrha blushed and looked away from him. "I have my eye on someone though, it's just that he hasn't exactly figured it out yet…"

"Uh…well I mean, your sister-"

"I flirt here and there, but none of my relationships have worked out so far. Still a single Pringle." Yang shrugged.

"Okay then… Blake! What about that Sun guy? Isn't he-"

"Uh, no. Not even close." Blake shook her head.

At this point, Ruby could visibly see Jaune sweating nervously, before he turned to the last member of the group, "...Weiss?"

She gave a silent thumbs down.

"Right. Okay, so, none of us are actually in a relationship besides you." Jaune scratched his neck awkwardly.

Ruby slammed her face on her cookie tray again.

"Now, now! That doesn't mean you're the odd one out! So you're just a little bit quicker than the rest of us in the dating game! That isn't such a big deal!" He reassured her, "I promise this won't change how we act towards you, okay? You're still the same Ruby we all know and love as before."

"You swear?"

"On my own mother's name." Jaune held a hand to his chest.

It took a moment of consideration before Ruby finally perked up again, sitting up straight and wiping the crumbs off her face. "That's a relief then… I thought for sure that things would start to get more awkward-"

"That being said!" Yang loudly interrupted the young speed-demon, as the three girls from team RWBY stood up from their seat in unison, much to Ruby's confusion.

"We all brought a small list of questions we wanted to ask you about your new boyfriend." Weiss began, bringing out a giant scroll. Like, an actual rolled up paper scroll, not the smart-device.

She held on one end as Blake started unfurling the other. "This shouldn't take more than maybe five hours or so." Blake said, laying the scroll on the lunch table and rolling it to the other end, reaching about five kilometers worth of questions.

"We're also going to record every answer in case we need references for the future. This is a completely mandatory and unavoidable process." Yang finished, pulling out headphones, a microphone, and some sort of recording device in front of Ruby.

Ruby stared stupefyingly at the long list of questions, before frowning at Jaune.

He could only nervously chuckle in response.

* * *

Phew! Finally, work is done and I get a night all to myself. No more White Fang duties for tonight, I get to sit back, relax, and get an actual full eight hours of sleep.

I hung my hoodie up and crashed on my sofa chair / sleeping bed and gave a relieved groan.

What a damn day. Thank goodness I was able to get through it all without anyone figuring out about who Ruby truly was.

Still, with that being said, I need to find a book or something to become a better liar. My poker face was genuine garbage and I was probably gonna get caught because of it.

Before I could fully relax though, my Scroll started ringing. I was almost hesitant to pick it up, dreading to see someone in the White Fang calling me back for extra work or maybe to tell me I screwed something up again…

But when I looked at the caller ID, I immediately sat up with an excited smile and put the Scroll to face-chat, "Ruby! Hey! I miss you!"

"Hey! I miss you too!" She waved happily at me, sporting her own lovely smile.

"How's it going? Good day today?"

"Ugh, I wish." Ruby rolled her eyes, "Somehow, all of my friends found out that I was in a relationship now, and they won't stop asking questions about you. I finally finished answering everything on their list, so now I just wanted to find a quiet place alone to calm down."

"Sounds hectic. I feel you on both a spiritual and physical level. Something like that happened to me today as well."

"Oh yeah? What happened?"

"Nothing much," I laid back in my seat, putting my feet up on my coffee table. "A few colleagues of mine noticed I was acting cheery and weird today, and found out it was because I found a girlfriend. They wanted to know about you just as much as your friends wanted to know about me."

"Heheh, what were they asking?" She giggled.

"' _What sort of girl is she?' 'Is she cute?' 'Is she sweet?' 'Do you really love each other?'_ Things like that."

"I guess this is like some sort of initiation everyone has to go through with their own group of friends."

"Yeah, silly isn't it?" I chuckled, "So what about you? What did your friends ask about me?"

"Eh… It was a little more strange, and specific. Things like, _'In a scenario where your life depends on protecting the contents inside a random purse you found, do you think you would be able to trust your boyfriend to hold on to it if you're ever in need of hiding?'_ And also things like, _'If you were put in a situation where you were locked in a room and forced to shoot two people, and the two in the room with you was a baby and your boyfriend, are you willing to shoot your boyfriend in any combination in order to save yourself or the baby?'_ "

I did a double-take, "The hell kind of friends do you have?"

"Weird friends. Huntress friends. Over-protective sister."

"Sh-... Should I be worried?"

"As long as they don't find out who you really are, I'm sure it'll be fine." She reassured me with a playful smile.

…

"You didn't tell them I was a White Fang member?" I asked.

"Of course not. How could I? I mean, I love my friends to death, but I don't think they would understand if I told them. Besides, you're not a bad person. That's all they need to know about you, you know?"

Hm.

"My colleagues asked me what type of Faunus you were."

"..." Ruby gave me a neutral look as she stayed silent.

"They didn't know you were a human. The thought never even crossed their minds."

"What did you say to them?"

"That you were a hamster Faunus. A cute adorable hamster Faunus with no discernible animal features besides an extremely hard to notice hamster tail that nobody can see unless you look very closely."

"Did they buy that?"

"All of them but one. His name is Finch. Luckily, he was a lot more understanding about it than I'd thought he'd be. He even said he was gonna keep it a secret from the others too."

"Oh…"

"Yeah… It's probably safer if we keep it that way. Most Faunus in the White Fang have been treated terribly by humans before, so a lot of them have some violent vendettas against your kind. Even worse that you're also a Huntress. Some of them would probably lynch me if they ever found out."

We stayed silent, looking at each other's eyes as we thought of what to say next.

"I never realized it until now…" Ruby started off, "but we really have a weird relationship, don't we?"

"Heh… Yeah. Keeping each other a secret within our own respective groups."

"Almost like a fairytale…"

"Like a setup for a really tragic fairytale."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"Hey Ruby… Do you regret having me as a boyfriend?"

"What? No! No, of course not! I love everything about you! It doesn't matter what sort of situation we're in, I would never even dream of regretting this."

"Even if it means I might make your life more difficult?"

"..." Ruby frowned, before a flame of determination sparked in her eyes as she looked at me with her powerful shining grey eyes, "I am **never** going to regret falling in love with you."

…

I blushed. Damn, she was _**really**_ hot when she was like this… So much of a contrast between her normally cheerful ditzy self, but, like, in a really attractive way. I dunno why, I just really like this side of her.

"I feel the same way…" I told her.

"...good…" She smiled, calming down again.

After that, we stayed silent for a while, content with just staring at each other through our Scroll screens.

It was weird, feeling comfortable just by staring at someone's face. I felt calm like this.

"I wish we were together at the Mint Factory right now…" Ruby suddenly said.

"Yeah. Even though it's only been a day, I miss you already."

"I… I- um…" Ruby started stammering, "So… Don't laugh…"

I raised an eyebrow, "What?"

"I… I kinda want you to kiss me again. Whenever I look at you, I keep thinking about what happened back at the park, and it's driving me nuts because I can't get the memory out of my head."

I couldn't help it. I turned my head and snorted.

"Hey! I just said don't laugh!" Ruby whined, sporting a noticeably red blush.

"Sorry… You're just acting really cute right now and I can't help it." I chuckled.

She pouted, before giving an indignant harrumph, "Forget I said anything…"

An idea popped in my head, and I looked over at my clock to see what time was left.

10:30 PM.

Air-transport station should be closed at eleven o'clock.

I'd be cutting it close, but yeah, let's do it.

"I can come visit you." I told her.

"Huh?"

"There's still time at the air docks. I can buy a ticket to visit you in Beacon right now."

"W-Wait, are you serious?!" Ruby asked in a panicked tone.

"Yeah, sure, why not? We won't be seeing each other again until Sunday. I'd drive myself crazy waiting that long."

"No, wait! I can't let you be in Beacon! If anyone in my team finds out, they're gonna hound you to death!" Ruby warned me. Then a thought occurred to her, and she offered a better idea, "Wait for me at the air docks. I'll go visit you instead."

"Sure, okay."

"See you soon?"

"Yeah! Definitely!"

With that, we both hung up and got ready for our sudden night-time date together.

I quickly combed my hair, used some deodorant, brushed my teeth, and after everything was said and done, I was already sprinting out in the streets.

* * *

Ruby combed her hair, rapidly chew through a can full of mints, wore her casual street clothes along with her favorite red hood, and she was already out in the hallways.

But before she could make it to the air transport, Ruby was stopped by her pesky sister, "Hold it missy!"

Ruby froze in place, feeling like a deer caught in headlights and was about to be shot dead for sport.

"Where do you think you're going out during this hour? It's a school day tomorrow."

Ruby slowly turned around to find her sister laying back against the wall with her arms crossed and a no-nonsense face.

"Oh! Hey there, Yang! I was just going out to… Uuuhhhh…" Ruby stammered, trying to come up with a decent and valid excuse.

Yang tapped her foot, waiting patiently for her sister to respond.

"Uuuhhh- the… Restroom?" Ruby said, unsure of even her own answer.

"The restroom?" Yang asked incredulously. "Wearing those clothes? Bringing along your utility belt? Even though we have our own bathroom in our team dorm?"

"..." Ruby didn't answer.

So instead she turned around and teleported away using her speed semblance, leaving behind a gust of rose petals.

"Gah- RUBY!" Yang clearly didn't expect her sister to be daringly tactless enough to leave so suddenly. With a sigh and shake of her head, she went back to her dorm room, "As long as she doesn't get into trouble, I guess I'll let it slide this time."

* * *

Ruby stepped out of the bullhead, already twisting and turning her head to look for me.

I waved at her to get her attention, "Over here!"

Ruby gave an ecstatic smile when she saw me, then suddenly disappeared from sight and was replaced by rose petals.

Before I could even question it, I felt a force collided with me as it wrapped it's adorable arms around my stomach.

"Jeez, you scared the crap out of me!" I chuckled, wrapping my arms around her.

Ruby looked up and smiled, "Hey, you."

"Hey, yourself." I smiled back.

"I missed you."

"I missed you too."

The moonlight was angled just right for it to shine right above Ruby's cute face. The setting was perfect, and we were right in each other's arms.

We just saw each other yesterday, but it still felt like forever since we last held each other like this. Nothing could spoil this moment.

"We don't have long until the air dock closes. I have to get back to Beacon before then." She reminded me.

"I know…"

Without another word, Ruby stood on her toes and tilted her head as she closed her eyes, her lips inches away from mine.

Unlike the last time, I didn't hesitate to lean in.

So we shared our second kiss. Let me tell you, it was a helluva lot better than our first.


End file.
